Poll: Best Cinema Director of the last 50 years

[floobie]

Hm. I voted Kubrick. I've basically liked every single movie he's made. I love Tarantino as well, but I have to give it to Kubrick. Coppola definitely had his moments as well. Woody Allen... not familiar enough with his stuff to say. The rest I would consider over-rated. The original Star Wars trilogy was fun, but even if I ignore the new trilogy, I didn't enjoy the originals nearly enough to think Lucas is a masterful director or something. Hitchcock... ugh. I know a lot of people adore his work. I've seen a handful of his movies, and I didn't even remotely enjoy any of them. James Cameron has had his moments (Terminator, Titanic, Aliens), but he's also made some pretty mediocre stuff (relative to my favorites, at least). And Michael Bay... holy crap no. No. No. No. NO.

Also:

- Christopher Nolan. He and Kubrick are easily my personal favourites. He hasn't made a movie I haven't adored.
- Coen Brothers. I'm not as big a fan of them as some people are, but they seem worth including in such a poll.
- Martin Scorcese. Ditto.
- Darren Aronofsky. I think he's extremely polarizing, but really damn good at what he does. His execution is always excellent, even if I can't always connect with his characters (for personal reasons).
- Stephen Spielberg. Even though he's attaching his name to all kinds of garbage lately, his own works are generally pretty great.
- Ridley Scott. His recent track record isn't the greatest (one might argue). But, I think he's worthy of inclusion in such a discussion. Exponentially more worthy than goddamn Michael Bay...

 

[zelda2fanboy]

Martin Scorsese, Martin Scorsese, and Martin Scorsese. Also, Robert Altman. I almost don't even want to vote.

A tie between Quentin and Lucas. American Graffiti is fucking A.

Hell to the yes. Thanks to the prequels and the lack of availability of the non-Special Editions, American Graffiti is better than Star Wars in my opinion. THX 1138 is a fun weirdo gem as well.

 

[face_head_mouth]

ALSO, Also, I haven't seen Guillermo Del Toro here so far, so I'll put him up for Hellboy, Hellboy 2, The Devils Backbone and the phenomenal Pan's Labyrinth.

See Cronos (his first movie) if you haven't already. One of the most original takes on the vampire mythology that I've ever seen.


If I strictly follow the "50 years" rule (meaning that some of the best Hitchcock and Kubrick movies would be ineligible for inclusion), I'd take Woody Allen. He's been pretty shaky for the last 15 years or so, but the sheer number of good and great (or at least interesting) films he made from the late 60s to the early 90s is unrivaled. I'd put Kubrick and Hitchcock slightly above him otherwise. Coppola made four of the best movies ever (right in a row, over 7 years), but he has been pretty inconsistent otherwise.

I actually like everyone on your list except Bay, but I don't want to dogpile on him. He gets more abuse than he probably deserves for making successful movies where lots of things Blow Up Real Good. If I could make that much money for making those movies (while traveling the world) I'd do it in a second.

I might pick Robert Altman or the Coen brothers myself, with David Lynch as another favorite. As many others have mentioned, David Fincher is doing great work as well.

 

[babinro]

Voted James Cameron based on the list in the responses because of Aliens and Terminator 2.

I don't pay any attention to directors though...so the reality is that Cameron is probably far from my favorite. In fact, I can pretty much list an equal amount of movies I like from all of these directors (including Michael Bay surprisingly).

 

[zelda2fanboy]

A lot of great directors are missing from this poll and Lucas, Cameron and Bay should not be in this poll.

In all fairness, Hitchcock shouldn't be either. Most of his movies were made pre-1961, so you can't count Psycho, Vertigo, North By Northwest, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Rear Window, Rope, Spellbound, etc. His best days were behind him at that point, more or less.

I voted for Woody Allen. 47 god damn movies, most of which I've seen. Sure, probably a dozen of them suck, but there are at least 10 pretty good ones, and many amazing ones. Even then, he would easily be on the list if he had just made the spoof movies Take The Money and Run, Bananas, and Sleeper. That shit rivals Airplane.

 

[octafish]

Robert Altman? The Coen Brothers? Sergio Leone? (His six big film were all in English) Terrence Mallick? Martin Scorsese? Roman Polanski?(Chinatown is in English that alone is enough to qualify him) David Cronenberg? Hell even Oliver Stone is better than Bay, Lucas, and Cameron.

Of that list probably Hitch. Just because of Godfather III. (I like One from the Heart).

 

[octafish]

You know what?
Edgar Wright.

I like that he was a fully formed film maker even when shooting Spaced. I eagerly await his next film. I didn't think much of Scott Pilgrim, for the content, not for the technique.

 

[Ensiferum]

No Guillermo Del Toro or Peter Jackson? BUT MICHAEL BAY???!!!!

Ahahaha, you sir are funny in your attempts to get me to nerd rage...

because of the limited choices I guess I'll go with Tarantino however the bottom 3 aren't even in the same league as the others. Maybe Cameron and Lucas were 20 years ago, but not anymore.

 

[Mitsu3474]

How did Scorcese not make this list? Or Terry Gilliam?

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

You can't make me pick between Hitchcock, Kubrick and Tarantino.

I refuse your poll good sir!

Also Zack Snyder although I'm not sure he's up with those guys yet. <3

George Lucas lol....:|

 

[Cropsy91]

Dario Argento, he can kind of speak english.

(as for the Poll, I picked Kubrick)

 

[Mr.Teatime]

I would have to go for Christopher Nolan as well, because he specializes in my favorite type of film. The Mind Screw.

 

[Hatchet90]

George Lucas, lol.

But if we're being serious, I'd say Francis Ford Coppola.

Where the hell is Nolan?

In the parallel world where The Dark Knight didn't suck.

I schmell a schmoll. These are always people who don't qualify as why, which is further evidence that they're only posting to irk people. If someone were to present some interesting reasons why they didn't like The Dark Knight, or Inception, I'd love to hear it, as especially with the former it seems that 90% of moviegoers loved it and 99% of comics fans loved it, so it would be a unique viewpoint.

Which, unfortunately, "(whatever you love) sucks!" is not.

Reasons? Okay, here you go:
Pretentious, dull, long, pretentious, unrealistic (but claims to be), overrated, pretentious, and yeah, did I mention pretentious?
Batman himself is awful. He is impotent in his own movie, growls all the time, his fights are dull and his batsuit looks like it was made for him before he got some extra pounds. And he's a goddamn hypocrite. When he didn't kill Joker it was purely to show "You see? Our hero. He doesn't kill the scorned ones". And couple of minutes later he kills Two-Face. Nice. Oh, and before Harvey became Two-Face, Bats had an enormous boner whenever he seen him for no apparent reason.
Joker is simply not a Joker. He is a f[flowers!]cking creepy lunatic, but he doesn't do anything Joker-ish in entire movie. Except maybe for the pencil trick. Where are jokes? I'm not talking about permawhite, or clownish killing devices, okay, but where are the jokes? Why is he wearing clown make up at all? He isn't a killer clown, he's a killer that dresses like a clown. There is a difference.
That chick Maggy Gylenhaal was playing was horrible and looked horrible.
Two-Face. Oh my god Two-Face. First, we're told that he had a nickname Harvey Two-Face. This was to establish his darker side. Okay. Then later he is shown interrogating the guy. Okay, kinda works. Then it's shown that the coin's sides are all the same. So he wouldn't have hurt the guy he was interrogating. So it wasn't actually so dark. Oops. Then his girlfriend dies, and this explosion instead of turning him into a psycho turns him into a f[rainbows!]cking idiot. Joker talks to him for five minutes and Harvey agrees that he should kill his friends and co-workers. What the hell. Oh, yeah, and where is the split personality thingamajig? And why his voice doesn't change when one side of his face is practically nothing but scull? And why the eye on this side is unharmed?
Lucius Fox is dime-a-dozen magical black man. At least Morgan Freeman (being THE magical black man of american cinema) does his job well.
Alfred is useless.
Jim Gordon became a pleasant surprise in this company of losers. For the first time in six (not counting Adam West and BW movies) movies he actually does shit! That's progress.
Dialogs. They are just horrible. The amount of pretentiousness makes guys in picture galleries sound like drunk teenagers. Apparently, mr. Nolan thinks he is a patron of the arts. He can think of himself whatever he wants, but this pretentious shit doesn't work in the movie, in which a man who dresses up like a bat fights a clown.
Overall atmosphere doesn't work either. There is a line after which the movie about a man who dresses up like a bat and fights a clown shouldn't take itself seriously. The Dark Knight doesn't even come close to this line, it starts with seriousness taken over 9000.
Well, does that make clear why I think TDK sucks?

I certainly smell a troll.


Or... are you? I laughed either way.

OT: Out of the choices on this list, I choose none of them. For Sidney Lumet is the greatest director, may he rest in peace.

 

[aashell13]

Just one quick question: why is michael " 'splosion man" bay on this list? I was under the impression that cinema directors were to tell stories, not orchestrate pay-per-view fireworks displays.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

What about Micheal Campbell....

nah, nah I can't even joke about that in text. xD *falls about laughing*

 

[icame]

Anyone who votes micheal bay best be trolling...

I can never decide on just one so my choices are Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, (Why is he not on the list? ... now that I think about it why isn't Spielberg.) and Alfred Hitchcock

EDIT: FML how could I forget guillermo del toro?

 

[Greatjusticeman]

I'm not even going to vote.

There are many other directors out there that blow these guys out of the water. Except for Francis.

I lol'ed when I saw Michael Bay on there.