Michôd was educated at Sydney Grammar School before moving to Melbourne to study arts at the University of Melbourne. After working for the Victorian Department of Education he decided to attend film school while in his mid-20s. He later served as Editor of Inside Film magazine, serving in the role between 2003 and 2006.
Michôd began his directing career in short films, with Ezra White, LL.B. in 2006 being one of the first to make an impact. In 2007 Michôd's next short film Crossbow, a coming-of-age drama was premiered at Venice Film Festival and received positive response from critics. After that the film compete at number of film festivals and earned good reviews. The film also screened at Sundance Film Festival and won Australian Film Institute Award for Best Screenplay in a Short Film.
Next year, in 2008 Michod directed another short film Netherland Dwarf, which was also screened at Sundance Film Festival and Berlin International Film Festival and earned positive reviews from critics. The same year, Michod co-directed Solo, a documentary film with Jennifer Peedom. It features the journey of Australian adventurer Andrew McAuley who went on a solo kayak crossing from Tasmania to New Zealand. The documentary received positive response on its release, Empire Online gave film five stars and said "As a tribute to a man – and man's – insatiable search for adventure, it's unforgettable." In 2009, Michod directed Inside the Square, a 30-minute behind-the-scene documentary on the making of 2008 film The Square directed by Nash Edgerton.
The film became the third highest grossing Australian film at the Australian box office for 2010, with a worldwide box office gross of US$5,775,563.
In the 2012 Sight & Sound Poll of the greatest films of all time Michôd chose Apocalypse Now, Alien, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Funny Games, Magnolia, Network, Sunset Blvd., The Thin Red Line, Taxi Driver and Werckmeister Harmonies as his top ten picks.
Michod's next film, a Futuristic Western entitled The Rover with Guy Pearce and Robert Pattinson. Filming began on 29 January 2013 in Southern Flinders Ranges, Australia and ended on 16 March 2013 in Marree, north of Adelaide, Australia. The film had its premiere out of competition in Midnight screening at 2014 Cannes Film Festival on 18 May 2014. Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter, said that "David Michod’s follow-up to his internationally successful debut with the Melbourne gangster saga Animal Kingdom is equally murderous but more pared down to basics, as desperate men enact a survival-of-the-meanest scenario in an economically gutted world reduced to Old West outlaw behavior."
On 14 April 2014, it was announced that Michôd will write and direct The Operators, based on the 2011 best seller of the same name by Michael Hastings. The film will be jointly produced by Plan B Entertainment, New Regency and RatPac Entertainment, with Brad Pitt attached to star. It was later retitled as War Machine. In March 2017, Netflix released a teaser trailer for the film in which Brad Pitt is playing a thinly veiled version of Stanley A. McChrystal. Hastings wrote the Rolling Stone article that revealed the friction between McChrystal’s staff and then President Barack Obama’s and would ultimately lead to McChrystal losing his job. Pitt’s character is named McMahon.
