Vladimír Balco was born on 16 July 1949. He graduated in documentary film directing at the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava in 1982 in the first generation of Bratislava-based documentarists. His debut feature was Angle of Vision / Uhol pohľadu (produced by Slovenská Filmová tvorba Bratislava, 1984) and starred young Martin Šulík, who soon became a renowned Slovak film director, in the main role.

Since 1992 he taught documentary film directing at the Film and Television Faculty of Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava, where he headed the documentary department from 2002 to 2013.

His most acclaimed films are Rivers of Babylon (produced by Alef Film and Media Group, 1998) and Pasodoble for Three / Pasodoble pre troch (produced by Slovenská Filmová tvorba Bratislava, 1986). Based on a bestseller written by Peter Pišťánek, Rivers of Babylon won the Crystal Globe award at the Karlovy Vary IFF in 1998.

Balco was currently preparing a documentary about the history of the artificial lake Liptovská Mara.