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Here are my choices for the 200 greatest directors of all time. It is
almost impossible to differentiate them once you get to this elite
level. Everyone on this list is a master of their craft.
Being ranked 57th should not be deemed an insult in any way whatsoever.
I have simply ranked them in order of my personal favorites, sprinkled
in a little historical influence and compared them with the "Sight &
Sound" rankings from the most recent poll.
The "Sight &Sound" rankings are those of the most comprehensive and
respected list in the world. Each decade (1952, 62, 72, 82, 92, 02)
"Sight & Sound" magazine gathers all the top critics and directors from
around the world and asks them to submit their choices for the ten best
films and 10 best directors of all time. In some cases you will note a
tie. You can see their lists on their official
website.As you
scroll down the list, I have added some of the films directed by those
who may be unfamiliar to some of you. Feel free to
email me your
list or notify me of a glaring omission. But above all, keep an
eye out for films by these directors... Forget plots or actors, the
director is the best way to discern the quality of a film before
viewing. |
|
DIRECTOR'S NAME |
MY RANK |
S&S
CRITICS |
S&S
DIRECTORS |
|
Alfred Hitchcock |
1 |
2 |
5 |
|
Stanley Kubrick |
2 |
5 |
6 |
|
Martin Scorsese |
3 |
|
tie
9 tie |
|
Federico Fellini |
4 |
7 |
2 |
|
Paul Thomas Anderson |
5 |
'Magnolia' |
|
Jean Renoir |
6 |
4 |
tie
9 tie |
|
Orson Welles |
7 |
1 |
1 |
|
Quentin Tarantino |
8 |
|
|
|
Billy Wilder |
9 |
|
7 |
|
Steven Spielberg |
10 |
|
|
|
Tom Tykwer |
11 |
'Run Lola Run', 'Heaven' |
|
Robert Altman |
12 |
|
|
|
David Lean |
13 |
|
tie
9 tie |
|
Akira Kurosawa |
14 |
6 |
3 |
|
Luis Buñuel |
15 |
'Belle de Jour' |
|
Yasujiro Ozu |
16 |
tie
10 tie |
|
|
Krzysztof Kieslowski |
17 |
'Blue', 'White', 'Red' |
|
Michelangelo Antonioni |
18 |
'L'Avventura' |
|
Sergei Eisenstein |
19 |
9 |
|
|
Ingmar Bergman |
20 |
|
8 |
|
Jean-Luc Godard |
21 |
3 |
|
|
Terrence Malick |
22 |
'The Thin Red Line' |
|
François Truffaut |
23 |
'Shoot the Piano Player' |
|
M. Night Shyamalan |
24 |
'The Village' |
|
James Cameron |
25 |
'Titanic' |
|
Woody Allen |
26 |
|
|
|
John Ford |
27 |
8 |
|
|
Jean-Pierre Jeunet |
28 |
'Amelie' |
|
Joel Coen |
29 |
'Fargo' |
|
Oliver Stone |
30 |
|
|
|
Cameron Crowe |
31 |
'Vanilla Sky' |
|
Werner Herzog |
32 |
'Wings of Desire' |
|
Elia Kazan |
33 |
'On the Waterfront' |
|
David Lynch |
34 |
'Mulholland Drive' |
|
Franklin J. Schaffner |
35 |
'Papillon', 'Patton' |
|
Michael Moore |
36 |
|
|
|
Buster Keaton |
37 |
'The General' |
|
Bernardo Bertolucci |
38 |
|
|
|
Doug Liman |
39 |
'Swingers', 'Bourne ID' |
|
Charles
Chaplin |
40 |
'City Lights' |
|
Robert Bresson |
41 |
'The Pickpocket' |
|
Fritz Lang |
42 |
'Metropolis' |
|
Mel Gibson |
43 |
|
|
|
Milos Forman |
44 |
'Amadeus' |
|
Peter Weir |
45 |
'The Truman Show' |
|
Anthony
Minghella |
46 |
'The English Patient' |
|
Robert Zemeckis |
47 |
|
|
|
Neil LaBute |
48 |
'In the Company of Men' |
|
Lars Von Trier |
49 |
'Dogville' |
|
Adrian Lyne |
50 |
'Unfaithful' |
|
Roman Polanski |
51 |
|
|
|
Stephen
Soderbergh |
52 |
'Traffic' |
|
Spike Lee |
53 |
|
|
|
Ron Howard |
54 |
|
|
|
Brian De Palma |
55 |
'Mission: Impossible' |
|
John Huston |
56 |
'The Maltese Falcon' |
|
Eric Rohmer |
57 |
'La Collectionneuse' |
|
F.W. Murnau |
58 |
'Sunrise' |
|
Darren
Aronofsky |
59 |
'Requiem for a Dream' |
|
Ridley Scott |
60 |
|
|
|
Clint Eastwood |
61 |
|
|
|
John
Frankenheimer |
62 |
'Ronin' |
|
Frank Darabont |
63 |
'Shawshank Redemption' |
|
Mathieu
Kassovitz |
64 |
'The Crimson Rivers' |
|
Gaspar Noé |
65 |
'Irreversible' |
|
Gabrielle
Muccino |
66 |
'The Last Kiss' |
|
Wolfgang
Peterson |
67 |
'Das Boot' |
|
Sam Peckinpah |
68 |
'Straw Dogs' |
|
R.W.
Fassbinder |
69 |
'Marriage of Maria Braun' |
|
Gus Van Sant |
70 |
'Gerry' |
|
John McTiernan |
71 |
'Die Hard' |
|
Francis Ford
Coppola |
72 |
tie
10 tie |
4 |
|
Sam Mendes |
73 |
'American Beauty' |
|
Mike Nichols |
74 |
'Closer' |
|
Sam Raimi |
75 |
'A Simple Plan' |
|
Sofia Coppola |
76 |
'Lost in Translation' |
|
Howard Hawks |
77 |
'The Big Sleep' |
|
Ang Lee |
78 |
'Brokeback Mountain' |
|
Atom Egoyan |
79 |
'Exotica' |
|
Mike Figgis |
80 |
'Leaving Las Vegas' |
|
Todd Haynes |
81 |
'Far From Heaven' |
|
Baz Luhrmann |
82 |
'Moulin Rouge' |
|
Gore Verbinski |
83 |
'The Ring' |
|
Curtis Hanson |
84 |
'L.A. Confidential' |
|
Lukas
Moodysson |
85 |
'Lilya 4-ever' |
|
Jean-Jacques
Annaud |
86 |
'Enemy at the Gates' |
|
Sidney Lumet |
87 |
|
|
|
William Wyler |
88 |
'Ben-Hur' |
|
Robert
Rodriguez |
89 |
'Desperado' |
|
Sergio Leone |
90 |
|
|
|
Christopher
Nolan |
91 |
'Memento' |
|
John Dahl |
92 |
'Rounders' |
|
John Sturges |
93 |
'The Great Escape' |
|
Michael
Winterbottom |
94 |
'Jude' |
|
Michel Gondry |
95 |
'Eternal Sunshine' |
|
Michael Curtiz |
96 |
'Casablanca' |
|
Andrew Davis |
97 |
'The Fugitive' |
|
David Mamet |
98 |
'The Spanish Prisoner' |
|
Luc Besson |
99 |
'The Professional' (Leon) |
|
Sydney Pollack |
100 |
|
|
|
Joe Wright |
101 |
'Pride & Prejudice' |
|
Gary Ross |
102 |
'Pleasantville' |
|
Alan Parker |
103 |
|
|
|
Spike Jonze |
104 |
'Being John Malkovich' |
|
Zach Braff |
105 |
'Garden State' |
|
Neil Jordan |
106 |
'The End of the Affair' |
|
Carol Reed |
107 |
'The Third Man' |
|
Alain Resnais |
108 |
'Last Year at Marienbad' |
|
Alexander Payne |
109 |
'About Schmidt' |
|
Todd Solondz |
110 |
'Happiness' |
|
Lasse Hallström |
111 |
'Chocolat' |
|
Pedro Almodovar |
112 |
'Talk to Her' |
|
Jacques Tati |
113 |
'Mr. Hulot's Holiday' |
|
Claude Chabrol |
114 |
'La Femme Infidele' |
|
Jacques Demy |
115 |
'Umbrellas of Cherbourg' |
|
Jean Vigo |
116 |
'L'Atalante' |
|
Norman Jewison |
117 |
'The Cincinnati Kid' |
|
Patrice Leconte |
118 |
'La Fille sur le Pont' |
|
Michael Mann |
119 |
'Heat' |
|
Harold Ramis |
120 |
'Groundhog Day' |
|
Louis Malle |
121 |
'Pretty Baby' |
|
Edward Zwick |
122 |
'The Last Samurai' |
|
Giuseppe Tornatore |
123 |
'Malena' |
|
Lawrence Kasdan |
124 |
'Grand Canyon' |
|
Andrei Tarkovsky |
125 |
'Solaris' |
|
Nora Ephron |
126 |
'Sleepless in Seattle' |
|
Phillip Noyce |
127 |
'Dead Calm' |
|
Mel Brooks |
128 |
'Blazing Saddle's |
|
Jacques Becker |
129 |
'Le Trou' |
|
Ernst Lubitsch |
130 |
'Ninotchka' |
|
Julio Medem |
131 |
'Sex & Lucia' |
|
Alejandro Amenábar |
132 |
'The Others' |
|
Jean Cocteau |
133 |
'Beauty & the Beast' |
|
Stephen Frears |
134 |
'Dangerous Liaisons' |
|
Claude Lelouch |
135 |
'A Man and a Woman' |
|
Jonathan Demme |
136 |
'Silence of the Lambs' |
|
Alejandro Gonz. Inarritu |
137 |
'Amores Perros' |
|
Joel Schumacher |
138 |
'Phone Booth' |
|
David Cronenberg |
139 |
'A History of Violence' |
|
Jonathan Mostow |
140 |
'Breakdown' |
|
Terry Zwigoff |
141 |
'Ghost World' |
|
Jacques Doillon |
142 |
'Ponette' |
|
Arthur Penn |
143 |
'Bonnie & Clyde' |
|
Jim Sheridan |
144 |
'In America' |
|
Chan-wook Park |
145 |
'Oldboy' |
|
Richard Donner |
146 |
'Maverick' |
|
David Fincher |
147 |
'Fight Club' |
|
Ivan Reitman |
148 |
'Six Days, Seven Nights' |
|
James Ivory |
149 |
'Remains of the Day' |
|
Alex Proyas |
150 |
'Dark City' |
|
Jim Jarmusch |
151 |
'Broken Flowers' |
|
Mike Leigh |
152 |
'Secrets & Lies' |
|
Amos Gitai |
153 |
'Free Zone' |
|
Frank Capra |
154 |
'It's a Wonderful Life' |
|
James L. Brooks |
155 |
'Spanglish' |
|
Barry Levinson |
156 |
'Bandits' |
|
Otto Preminger |
157 |
'Anatomy of a Murder' |
|
Blake Edwards |
158 |
'The Party' |
|
Agnès Varda |
159 |
'Cleo from 5 to 7' |
|
Franco Zeffirelli |
160 |
'The Champ' |
|
James Mangold |
161 |
'Cop Land' |
|
Fernando Meirelles |
162 |
'Constant Gardner' |
|
Hirokazu Koreeda |
163 |
'After Life' |
|
Ferzan Ozpetek |
164 |
'Facing Windows' |
|
Jane Campion |
165 |
'The Piano' |
|
Marc Forster |
166 |
'Monster's Ball' |
|
Alfonso Cuaron |
167 |
'Great Expectations' |
|
Russ Meyer |
168 |
'Valley of the Dolls' |
|
John Landis |
169 |
'Spies Like Us' |
|
Christopher Guest |
170 |
'Best in Show' |
|
Michael Apted |
171 |
'Extreme Measures' |
|
David Yates |
172 |
'The Girl in the Cafe' |
|
Robert Redford |
173 |
'Ordinary People' |
|
François Ozon |
174 |
'8 Women' |
|
Abel Ferrara |
175 |
'Bad Lieutenant' |
|
Michael Cimino |
176 |
'The Deer Hunter' |
|
Denys Arcand |
177 |
'Barbarian Invasions' |
|
Tony Scott |
178 |
'Crimson Tide' |
|
Julie Taymor |
179 |
'Frida' |
|
David Gordon Green |
180 |
'All the Real Girls' |
|
John Singleton |
181 |
'Boyz in da Hood' |
|
Alexandre Aja |
182 |
'Haute Tension' |
|
William Friedkin |
183 |
'The Exorcist' |
|
Wes Anderson |
184 |
'Rushmore' |
|
Stephen Sommers |
185 |
'The Mummy' |
|
Paul Verhoeven |
186 |
'Basic Instinct' |
|
Wes Craven |
187 |
'Red Eye' |
|
Tim Burton |
188 |
'Ed Wood' |
|
George Clooney |
189 |
'Good Night, Good Luck' |
|
Richard Shepard |
190 |
'The Matador' |
|
Anand Tucker |
191 |
'Shopgirl' |
|
Rob Marshall |
192 |
'Chicago' |
|
Christophe Gans |
193 |
'Brotherhood of the Wolf' |
|
Jean-Pierre/Luc Dardenne |
194 |
'Rosetta' |
|
Cristina Comencini |
195 |
'La Bestia nel cuore' |
|
Stephen Gaghan |
196 |
'Syriana' |
|
Paul Haggis |
197 |
'Crash' |
|
Terry Gilliam |
198 |
'Brazil' |
|
Bart Freundlich |
199 |
'Myth of Fingerprints' |
|
Hayao Miyazaki |
200 |
'Spirited Away' |
|
