Zemeckis.  Zemeckis is a technological innovator and architect of great blockbusters for over 30 years now (ok so only 2 so far in the 21st century so it’s been quiet lately). There are some Zemeckis detractors out there but his 10 year stretch from 1985-1994 that included Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and Forrest Gump is a very impressive run. He’s also remarkably consistent in his obsessions for a big budget director. Back to the Future opens with a bang-- a oner tracking shot setting up the time motif Best film:  Back to the Future. Its critical reputation has really grown in the

Fleming.  Fleming has two films in the top 100 (wow!) and 5 in the top 100 of their respective decade. So what gives? That resume should put him closer to a top 50 director than #118. The issue is the level of authorship (in general- there aren’t a lot of Flemingisms’) specifically when it comes to Gone With the Wind- which is technically his best film. Mostly, I stick by the “directed by” byline but I’ve just read too much about David O. Selznick, the making of this film, and how much was shot by George Cukor to just

Reed. A second viewing of Odd Man Out could change Reed’s placement here and push him closer to the top 100 (or even in it). The visual evidence here below with the images below is pretty compelling—these are gorgeous photographes and look like The Third Man. For now though, Reed’s strength here for the purposes of this list is The Third Man. The film ranks as the #42 of all-time and #4 of the 1940’s. Get this- all 41 films ranked ahead of The Third Man have their director already mentioned as directors 1 thru 117 on this list

Vidor. King Vidor to be specific (not Charles Vidor who directed Gilda) is the #117 best director of all-time.  His strength is his depth of quality in his body of work- especially having 6 films that fall into the top 100 of their respective decade. That’s an accomplished career. As you can see here on the page, Vidor was known for big films-- superior visuals (or I’d have a bunch of film posters here as I have to resort to sometimes). His weakness is the zero films in the top 350 of all-time. Best film:  The Crowd. I’ve got

Whale. James Whale’s strength is he was a major auteur in the 1930’s. His output includes four films that land in the top 100 of that decade. His filmography ranks him out at #122 overall but it’s difficult to find auteurs at this point that both A) have a personal visual stamp (which he does with his gothic visuals and mise-en-scene) and B) have, again, four films that landed in their respective decades’ top 100. His weakness is the lack of depth here with only 5 total archiveable films and only one film in the top 500 of all-time

Jackson. Obviously Jackson isn’t on this list without The Lord of the Rings but the momentous achievement of that masterpiece cannot overlooked. I count The Lord of the Rings as one film in the same way I count Dekalog  or Kill bill as one film. However, I do put more weight in the size of this 10 hour masterpiece than I do with some masterpieces that I feel are even on the same level as  LOTR (which is tough to reason out logically but whatever). It’s been a rough stretch for Jackson since King Kong in 2005 and that’s the weakness. Still, King Kong is good

Fuller. “If you don’t like Sam Fuller, you just don’t like cinema.” – Martin Scorsese. How about that? haha. For the purposes of this list fuller’s weakness is his best film (certainly he can’t match Carol Reed, Peter Jackson, George Lucas, Victor Fleming or some others that fall behind him on the list here). Where he whoops those names is in the depth of his body of work. Fuller’s 8th best film is damn good and has his stamp of authorship. His films are just strange-- B-movies, often visceral, grim gut-punches. He feels self-taught because he uses angles and

Argento. Dario Argento is the master of Italian Giallo - a horror subgenre. His filmography (mostly on the strength of Suspiria) ranks him 98th and he’s definitely a style-plus auteur. That’s his case (and that’s why it may seem like I’m underrating him at #113 here). He has a single film that’s superior to anything made by Spielberg, The Coen Brothers, Cronenberg, Sirk, or Fincher. In fact, the only directors with a film rated higher on the all-time top 500 list than Suspiria- who I haven’t got to on my list of all-time directors- are Stanley Donen, Carol Reed,

Curtiz. Curtiz is the pretty far down this list for someone with a masterpiece on the level of Casablanca. He’s not a “style-plus” director and his auteur status can’t match his own filmography (he has the #90 overall ranked filmography) but I also think he’s a stronger candidate for this list than Victor Fleming or Carol Reed. Curtiz has 17 archiveable films but obviously isn’t on this list without Casablanca. Casablanca is one of the best films of all-time and has often been called cinema’s “happy accident” (meaning a great combination of elements: writing, acting, music, etc) and is often brought up

Hsiao-Hsien Hou. I am in a difficult spot with HHH. The ranking of the best directors of all-time is a project I started in early 2019 (largely based on my list of the top 500 films of all-time- also completed in early 2019). HHH didn’t factor on that top 500 list at all. My knowledge of his work was severely lacking. However, I remedied that with a study of his work during 2019 and it’s obvious he’s a distinguished and worthy auteur—he has several films that will make for a nice addition to the top 500 when I updated

Kazan. Kazan’s strength is his unparalleled work with actors and that just gets eclipsed by so many auteurs with a superior cinematic style. That said- his filmography and impact on naturalism and acting is still an extremely important movement in cinema history. I’m not giving him full credit for Brando’s power on cinema in the 50’s (along with Montgomery Clift and James Dean) but he’s not the simple beneficiary of pointing the camera at Brando either or being in the right place at the right time. On the Waterfront is legit and Kazan has another 4 films that are somewhere in

Nolan.  Christopher Nolan is right there with Iñárritu as the best director to have his first archiveable film in the 21st century. As I said with Iñárritu my main guidance for this list is the list of the top 500 films and that list has a 10-year moratorium on all new films. So my guiding metric for this list doesn’t include films from 2009-present. Nolan may very well be the best auteur on the planet during that stretch so needless to say he’ll skyrocket up this list the next time I update it (if you’re the best of a decade