Directors with a movie in both my top 1,000 and my bottom 1,000

by ImmortanScott | created - 16 Dec 2020 | updated - 09 Jan 2023 | Public

My top 1,000: https://letterboxd.com/immortan_scott/list/my-1000-favorite-movies/

My bottom 1,000: https://letterboxd.com/immortan_scott/list/my-least-favorite-movies/

1. Tomas Alfredson

Director | Låt den rätte komma in

Tomas Alfredson was born on April 1, 1965 in Lidingö, Stockholms län, Sweden. He is a director, known for Let the Right One In (2008), Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) and The Snowman (2017). He is married to Charlotte Alfredson. They have one child. He was previously married to Cissi Elwin.

Best film: Let the Right One In

Worst film: The Snowman

2. Robert Altman

Director | Gosford Park

Robert Altman was born on February 20th, 1925 in Kansas City, Missouri, to B.C. (an insurance salesman) and Helen Altman. He entered St. Peters Catholic school at the age six, and spent a short time at a Catholic high school. From there, he went to Rockhurst High School. It was then that he started...

Best film-Nashville

Worst film-Prêt-à-Porter

3. Warren Beatty

Actor | Heaven Can Wait

Since starring in his first film, Splendor in the Grass (1961), Warren Beatty has been said to have demonstrated a greater longevity in movies than any actor of his generation. Few people have taken so many responsibilities for all phases of the production of films as producer, director, writer, ...

Best film-Reds

Worst film-Bulworth

4. John Boorman

Producer | Hope and Glory

John Boorman attended Catholic school (Salesian Order) although his family was not, in fact, Roman Catholic. His first job was for a dry-cleaner. Later, he worked as a critic for a women's journal and for a radio station until he entered the television business, working for the BBC in Bristol. ...

Best film-Point Blank

Worst film-Exorcist II: The Heretic

5. Danny Boyle

Director | 127 Hours

Daniel Francis Boyle is a British filmmaker, producer and writer from Radcliffe, Greater Manchester. He is known for directing 28 Days Later, 127 Hours, Trainspotting, T2 Trainspotting, Slumdog Millionaire, Millions, Shallow Grave, The Beach, Yesterday, and Steve Jobs. He won many awards for ...

Best film-Trainspotting

Worst film-The Beach

6. Martin Brest

Director | Scent of a Woman

Martin Brest was born on August 8, 1951 in The Bronx, New York City, New York, USA. He is a director and writer, known for Scent of a Woman (1992), Midnight Run (1988) and Beverly Hills Cop (1984).

Best film-Midnight Run

Worst film-Gigli

7. Tim Burton

Producer | Edward Scissorhands

Timothy Walter Burton was born in Burbank, California, to Jean Rae (Erickson), who owned a cat-themed gift shop, and William Reed Burton, who worked for the Burbank Park and Recreation Department. He spent most of his childhood as a recluse, drawing cartoons, and watching old movies (he was ...

Best film-Ed Wood

Worst film-Alice in Wonderland

8. Jane Campion

Writer | Bright Star

Jane Campion was born in Wellington, New Zealand, and now lives in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Having graduated with a BA in Anthropology from Victoria University of Wellington in 1975, and a BA, with a painting major, at Sydney College of the Arts in 1979, she began filmmaking in the early...

Best film-The Piano

Worst film-Holy Smoke

9. John Carpenter

Writer | The Fog

John Howard Carpenter was born in Carthage, New York, to mother Milton Jean (Carter) and father Howard Ralph Carpenter. His family moved to Bowling Green, Kentucky, where his father, a professor, was head of the music department at Western Kentucky University. He attended Western Kentucky ...

Best film-The Thing

Worst film-Escape from L.A.

10. Damien Chazelle

Writer | La La Land

Damien Sayre Chazelle is an American director and screenwriter. He was born in Providence, Rhode Island. His mother, Celia Sayre (Martin) Chazelle, is an American-Canadian writer and professor of history at The College of New Jersey. His father, Bernard Chazelle, is a French-American Eugene Higgins...

Best film-Whiplash

Worst film-Babylon

11. Bob Clark

Director | A Christmas Story

Bob Clark was born on August 5, 1939 in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. He was a director and writer, known for A Christmas Story (1983), Baby Geniuses (1999) and Porky's (1981). He died on April 4, 2007 in Pacific Palisades, California, USA.

Best film-A Christmas Story

Worst film-Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2

12. Jack Clayton

Producer | The Innocents

Jack Clayton was born on March 1, 1921 in Brighton, East Sussex, England, UK. He was a producer and director, known for The Innocents (1961), Our Mother's House (1967) and The Great Gatsby (1974). He was married to Haya Harareet, Katherine Kath and Christine Norden. He died on February 26, 1995 in ...

Best film-The Innocents

Worst film-The Great Gatsby

13. George Clooney

Actor | The Ides of March

George Timothy Clooney was born on May 6, 1961, in Lexington, Kentucky, to Nina Bruce (née Warren), a former beauty pageant queen, and Nick Clooney, a former anchorman and television host (who was also the brother of singer Rosemary Clooney). He has Irish, English, and German ancestry. Clooney ...

Best film-Good Night, and Good Luck.

Worst film-Suburbicon

14. Francis Ford Coppola

Producer | Apocalypse Now

Francis Ford Coppola was born in 1939 in Detroit, Michigan, but grew up in a New York suburb in a creative, supportive Italian-American family. His father, Carmine Coppola, was a composer and musician. His mother, Italia Coppola (née Pennino), had been an actress. Francis Ford Coppola graduated ...

Best film-The Godfather

Worst film-Twixt

15. Cameron Crowe

Writer | Almost Famous

Certainly idiosyncratic as a writer, Cameron Crowe has created a series of scripts that, while liked by the critics, were considered offbeat and difficult to market.

Cameron Bruce Crowe was born in Palm Springs, California, to Alice Marie Crowe (née George), a teacher and activist, and James A. ...

Best film-Almost Famous

Worst film-Aloha

16. Brian De Palma

Director | Body Double

Brian De Palma is one of the well-known directors who spear-headed the new movement in Hollywood during the 1970s. He is known for his many films that go from violent pictures, to Hitchcock-like thrillers. Born on September 11, 1940, De Palma was born in Newark, New Jersey in an Italian-American ...

Best film-Scarface

Worst film-The Bonfire of the Vanities

17. Richard Donner

Director | Superman

Richard Donner was born on April 24, 1930 in The Bronx, New York City, New York, USA. He was a director and producer, known for Superman (1978), Ladyhawke (1985) and Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut (1980). He was married to Lauren Shuler Donner. He died on July 5, 2021 in Los Angeles, ...

Best film-Superman

Worst film-Timeline

18. Clint Eastwood

Actor | Million Dollar Baby

Clint Eastwood was born May 31, 1930 in San Francisco, to Clinton Eastwood Sr., a bond salesman and later manufacturing executive for Georgia-Pacific Corporation, and Ruth Wood (née Margret Ruth Runner), a housewife turned IBM clerk. He grew up in nearby Piedmont. At school Clint took interest in ...

Best film-Unforgiven

Worst film-The Rookie

19. David Fincher

Director | Se7en

David Fincher was born in 1962 in Denver, Colorado, and was raised in Marin County, California. When he was 18 years old he went to work for John Korty at Korty Films in Mill Valley. He subsequently worked at ILM (Industrial Light and Magic) from 1981-1983. Fincher left ILM to direct TV commercials...

Best film-The Social Network

Worst film-Mank

20. James Foley

Director | At Close Range

James Foley was born in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA. He is a director and writer, known for At Close Range (1986), After Dark, My Sweet (1990) and Glengarry Glen Ross (1992).

Best film-Glengarry Glen Ross

Worst film-Fifty Shades Darker

21. John Frankenheimer

Director | The Manchurian Candidate

Born in New York and raised in Queens, John Frankenheimer wanted to become a professional tennis player. He loved movies and his favorite actor was Robert Mitchum. He decided he wanted to be an actor but then he applied for and was accepted in the Motion Picture Squadron of the Air Force where he ...

Best film-The Manchurian Candidate

Worst film-Reindeer Games

22. William Friedkin

Director | To Live and Die in L.A.

Friedkin's mother was an operating room nurse. His father was a merchant seaman, semi-pro softball player and ultimately sold clothes in a men's discount chain. Ultimately, his father never earned more than $50/week in his whole life and died indigent. Eventually young Will became infatuated with ...

Best film-The Exorcist

Worst film-Jade

23. Terry Gilliam

Writer | Brazil

Terry Gilliam was born near Medicine Lake, Minnesota. When he was 12 his family moved to Los Angeles where he became a fan of MAD magazine. In his early twenties he was often stopped by the police who suspected him of being a drug addict and Gilliam had to explain that he worked in advertising. In ...

Best film-Brazil

Worst film-The Brothers Grimm

24. Jean-Luc Godard

Director | Bande à part

Jean-Luc Godard was born in Paris on December 3, 1930, the second of four children in a bourgeois Franco-Swiss family. His father was a doctor who owned a private clinic, and his mother came from a preeminent family of Swiss bankers. During World War II Godard became a naturalized citizen of ...

Best film-Breathless

Worst film-In Praise of Love

25. Amy Heckerling

Writer | Clueless

Amy Heckerling studied Film and TV at New York University and got a Masters Degree in Film from The American Film Institute. Despite this education she couldn't get a break in Hollywood. However, in 1982, she made Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), and people started to take notice. In 1985, ...

Best film-Clueless

Worst film-Look Who's Talking Too

26. Walter Hill

Writer | 48 Hrs.

Hill was born in Long Beach, California and educated at Mexico City College and Michigan State University. He worked in oil drilling and construction in the 60s before becoming a 2nd assistant director in 1967. He has written and co-written screenplays, including several uncredited works. He has ...

Best film-The Warriors

Worst film-Supernova

27. Oliver Hirschbiegel

Director | Das Experiment

Born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1957. In his teens he left high school and worked as a cooker in a boat.

Then he studied painting and graphism in the Academy of arts in Hamburg where he also started experimenting with video and photography. Those experimental movies attracted the attention of some ...

Best film-Downfall

Worst film-Diana

28. Ishirô Honda

Director | Gojira

Influential Japanese film director born May 7th, 1911, often credited as being the father of Godzilla. His name is a combination of "I" (or Ino), meaning "boar", and "shirô," meaning fourth son in the family. Originally, the young Honda had aspirations of becoming an artist; however, as he entered ...

Best film-Godzilla

Worst film-All Monsters Attack

29. Ron Howard

Producer | Arrested Development

Academy Award-winning filmmaker Ron Howard is one of this generation's most popular directors. From the critically acclaimed dramas A Beautiful Mind (2001) and Apollo 13 (1995) to the hit comedies Parenthood (1989) and Splash (1983), he has created some of Hollywood's most memorable films.

Howard ...

Best film-Apollo 11

Worst film-Angels & Demons

30. Peter Jackson

Producer | The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

Sir Peter Jackson made history with The Lord of the Rings trilogy, becoming the first person to direct three major feature films simultaneously. The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King were nominated for and collected a slew of awards from around the globe, with The ...

Best film-The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

Worst film-The Lovely Bones

31. Jim Jarmusch

Director | Paterson

Moved to New York City at the age of seventeen from Akron, Ohio. Graduated from Columbia University with a B.A. in English, class of '75. Without any prior film experience, he was accepted into the Tisch School of the Arts, New York.

Best film-Night on Earth

Worst film-The Limits of Control

32. Lawrence Kasdan

Writer | The Big Chill

Lawrence Kasdan is an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. He directed Body Heat, Grand Canyon, The Big Chill, Silverado and Dreamcatcher. He wrote Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Bodyguard, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, The Force Awakens and Solo: A Star Wars Story. He is ...

Best film-Body Heat

Worst film-Wyatt Earp

33. Mathieu Kassovitz

Actor | Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain

Mathieu Kassovitz was born on August 3, 1967 in Paris, France. He is an actor and director, known for Amélie (2001), La haine (1995) and The Fifth Element (1997).

Best film-La Haine

Worst film-Gothika

34. Philip Kaufman

Writer | The Right Stuff

Director and screenwriter Philip Kaufman was born in Chicago, Illinois. He attended the University of Chicago and later Harvard Law School. He won the Prix de la Nouvelle Critique at Cannes in 1965 for his film Goldstein (1964). He was the screenwriter for The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976) and was to ...

Best film-Invasion of the Body Snatchers

Worst film-Twisted

35. John Landis

Director | The Blues Brothers

John Landis began his career in the mail room of 20th Century-Fox. A high-school dropout, 18-year-old Landis made his way to Yugoslavia to work as a production assistant on Kelly's Heroes (1970). Remaining in Europe, Landis found work as an actor, extra and stuntman in many of the Spanish/Italian "...

Best film-The Blues Brothers

Worst film-Blues Brothers 2000

36. Spike Lee

Director | Do the Right Thing

Spike Lee was born Shelton Jackson Lee on March 20, 1957, in Atlanta, Georgia. At a very young age, he moved from pre-civil rights Georgia, to Brooklyn, New York. Lee came from artistic, education-grounded background; his father was a jazz musician, and his mother, a schoolteacher. He attended ...

Best film-Do the Right Thing

Worst film-She Hate Me

37. Michael Lehmann

Director | Heathers

Michael Lehmann was born on March 30, 1957 in San Francisco, California, USA. He is a director and producer, known for Heathers (1988), Hudson Hawk (1991) and American Horror Story (2011). He is married to Holland Sutton.

Best film-Heathers

Worst film-Because I Said So

38. Richard Lester

Director | A Hard Day's Night

Richard Lester was one of the most influential directors of the 1960s, and continued his career into the 1970s and early '80s. He is best remembered for the two films he helmed starring The Beatles: A Hard Day's Night (1964) and Help! (1965), the frenetic cutting style of which was seen by many as ...

Best film-A Hard Day's Night

Worst film-Superman III

39. Richard Loncraine

Director | Richard III

Richard Loncraine has earned great acclaim for his work in film, television and commercials. He studied sculpture at the Central School of Art before attending the Royal College of Art Film School. He spent three years working for the BBC before moving into commercials. Since those days he has ...

Best film-Richard III

Worst film-Firewall

40. Adrian Lyne

Director | Jacob's Ladder

Adrian Lyne (Director/Writer/Producer) is the creative force behind some of the most talked-about movies of our time, among them, Fatal Attraction (1987), 9½ Weeks (1986) and Indecent Proposal (1993).

Born in Peterborough, England and raised in London, Lyne attended the Highgate school, where...

Best film-Jacob's Ladder

Worst film-Indecent Proposal

41. John McTiernan

Director | Die Hard

John McTiernan was born on January 8, 1951 in Albany, New York, USA. He is a director and producer, known for Die Hard (1988), Rollerball (2002) and Last Action Hero (1993). He has been married to Gail Sistrunk since 2012. He was previously married to Kate Harrington, Donna Dubrow and Carol Land.

Best film-Die Hard

Worst film-Rollerball

42. Sam Mendes

Producer | 1917

Samuel Alexander Mendes was born on August 1, 1965 in Reading, England, UK to parents James Peter Mendes, a retired university lecturer, and Valerie Helene Mendes, an author who writes children's books. Their marriage didn't last long, James divorced Sam's mother in 1970 when Sam was just 5-...

Best film-Road to Perdition

Worst film-American Beauty

43. Andrew Niccol

Writer | GATTACA

New Zealand-born screenwriter-director Andrew Niccol began his career in London, successfully directing TV commercials before moving to Los Angeles in order to make films "longer than 60 seconds." He interested high-powered producer Scott Rudin in his The Truman Show (1998) script, but Rudin was not...

Best film-Gattaca

Worst film-The Host

44. Alan Parker

Director | Evita

The son of Elsie Ellen, a dressmaker, and William Leslie Parker, a house painter, Alan Parker was a London advertising copywriter in the 1960s and early 1970s with Collett Dickenson Pearce (CDP), an ad agency. He formed a partnership with David Puttnam as his producer (Puttnam had been a ...

Best film-Pink Floyd: The Wall

Worst film-The Life of David Gale

45. Alexander Payne

Director | Nebraska

Director, producer and screenwriter Alexander Payne was born in Omaha, Nebraska. His parents, Peggy (Constantine) and George Payne, ran a Greek restaurant. His father is of Greek and German ancestry, and his mother is of Greek descent; the family name was originally Papadopoulos. He is the youngest...

Best film-Election

Worst film-Downsizing

46. Roman Polanski

Director | Chinatown

Roman Polanski is a Polish film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in Poland, Britain, France and the USA, he is considered one of the few truly international filmmakers. Roman Polanski was born in Paris in 1933.

His parents returned to Poland from France in 1936, three years ...

Best film-Chinatown

Worst film-What?

47. Alex Proyas

Director | Dark City

Alex Proyas has moved effortlessly between helming TV commercials and music videos to feature films. Born to Greek parents in Egypt, Proyas relocated to Australia with his family when he was three years old. He began making films at age ten and went on to attend the Australian Film Television and ...

Best film-Dark City

Worst film-Gods of Egypt

48. Harold Ramis

Writer | Ghostbusters

Born on November 21, 1944 in Chicago, Illinois, Harold Allen Ramis got his start in comedy as Playboy magazine's joke editor and reviewer. In 1969, he joined Chicago's Second City's Improvisational Theatre Troupe before moving to New York to help write and perform in "The National Lampoon Show" ...

Best film-Groundhog Day

Worst film-Year One

49. Rob Reiner

Actor | All in the Family

Robert Reiner was born in New York City, to Estelle Reiner (née Lebost) and Emmy-winning actor, comedian, writer, and producer Carl Reiner.

As a child, his father was his role model, as Carl Reiner created and starred in The Dick Van Dyke Show. Estelle was also an inspiration for him to become a ...

Best film-The Princess Bride

Worst film-Rumor Has It...

NOTE: I haven't seen North

50. Jason Reitman

Producer | Up in the Air

Jason Reitman is a Canadian filmmaker and producer who notably directed Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Juno, Thank You for Smoking, Up in the Air, Young Adult and Tully. He produced Chloe and Jennifer's Body, two films that advanced Amanda Seyfried's career for adult oriented roles. He is the son of Ivan...

Best film-Up in the Air

Worst film-Men, Women, & Children

51. Carlos Reygadas

Producer | Stellet Licht

Carlos Reygadas was born on October 10, 1971 in Mexico City, Distrito Federal, Mexico. He is a producer and director, known for Silent Light (2007), Japan (2002) and Post Tenebras Lux (2012). He is married to Natalia López.

Best film-Silent Light

Worst film-Battle in Heaven

52. Michael Ritchie

Director | The Golden Child

Michael Ritchie was born on November 28, 1938 in Waukesha, Wisconsin, USA. He was a director and producer, known for The Golden Child (1986), The Island (1980) and Fletch (1985). He was married to Jimmie Brown and Georgina Tebrock. He died on April 16, 2001 in New York City, New York, USA.

Best film-The Bad News Bears

Worst film-The Golden Child

53. Mark Rydell

Actor | The Long Goodbye

Mark Rydell was born on March 23, 1929 in New York City, New York, USA. He is a director and actor, known for The Long Goodbye (1973), On Golden Pond (1981) and Hollywood Ending (2002). He was previously married to Esther Jacobs and Joanne Linville.

Best film-On Golden Pond

Worst film-Intersection

54. John Schlesinger

Director | Midnight Cowboy

Oscar-winning director John Schlesinger, who was born in London, on February 16, 1926, was the eldest child in a solidly middle-class Jewish family. Berbard Schlesinger, his father, was a pediatrician, and his mother, Winifred, was a musician. He served in the Army in the Far East during World War ...

Best film-Midnight Cowboy

Worst film-Honky Tonk Freeway

55. Ridley Scott

Producer | The Martian

Described by film producer Michael Deeley as "the very best eye in the business", director Ridley Scott was born on November 30, 1937 in South Shields, Tyne and Wear. His father was an officer in the Royal Engineers and the family followed him as his career posted him throughout the United Kingdom ...

Best film-Blade Runner

Worst film-The Counselor

56. M. Night Shyamalan

Producer | Lady in the Water

Born in Puducherry, India, and raised in the posh suburban Penn Valley area of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, M. Night Shyamalan is a film director, screenwriter, producer, and occasional actor, known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots.

He is the son of Jayalakshmi, a Tamil ...

Best film-The Sixth Sense

Worst film-The Last Airbender

57. Bryan Singer

Director | X-Men

Bryan Singer is an American film director and producer who got his start writing and co-directing the short film Lions Den with his classmates while he attended USC. He was hired by 20th Century Fox to direct X-Men, which helped kick-start the superhero renaissance. He later directed three sequels....

Best film-The Usual Suspects

Worst film-X-Men: Apocalypse

58. John Singleton

Writer | Boyz n the Hood

Son of Danny Singleton, a mortgage broker, and Sheila Ward, a pharmaceutical company sales executive, and raised in separate households by his unmarried parents, John Singleton attended the Film Writing Program at USC, after graduating from high school in 1986. While studying there, he won three ...

Best film-Boyz n the Hood

Worst film-2 Fast 2 Furious

59. Kevin Smith

Producer | Clerks

Kevin Patrick Smith was born in Red Bank but grew up in Highlands, New Jersey, the son of Grace (Schultz) and Donald E. Smith, a postal worker. He is very proud of his native state; this fact can be seen in all of his movies. Kevin is of mostly German, with some Irish and English, ancestry.

His ...

Best film-Clerks

Worst film-Cop Out

60. Steven Soderbergh

Director | Sex, Lies, and Videotape

Steven Andrew Soderbergh was born on January 14, 1963 in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, the second of six children of Mary Ann (Bernard) and Peter Soderbergh. His father was of Swedish and Irish descent, and his mother was of Italian ancestry. While he was still at a very young age, his family moved to ...

Best film-Out of Sight

Worst film-The Laundromat

61. Steven Spielberg

Producer | Schindler's List

One of the most influential personalities in the history of cinema, Steven Spielberg is Hollywood's best known director and one of the wealthiest filmmakers in the world. He has an extraordinary number of commercially successful and critically acclaimed credits to his name, either as a director, ...

Best film-Raiders of the Lost Ark

Worst film-Ready Player One

62. Gus Van Sant

Director | Elephant

Gus Green Van Sant Jr. is an American filmmaker, painter, screenwriter, photographer and musician from Louisville, Kentucky who is known for directing films such as Good Will Hunting, the 1998 remake of Psycho, Gerry, Elephant, My Own Private Idaho, To Die For, Milk, Last Days, Finding Forrester, ...

Best film-Elephant

Worst film-Psycho

63. Paul Verhoeven

Director | RoboCop

Paul Verhoeven graduated from the University of Leiden, with a degree in math and physics. He entered the Royal Netherlands Navy, where he began his film career by making documentaries for the Navy and later for TV. In 1969, he directed the popular Dutch TV series, Floris (1969), about a medieval ...

Best film-RoboCop

Worst film-Hollow Man

64. Lana Wachowski

Writer | The Matrix

Lana Wachowski and her sister Lilly Wachowski, also known as the Wachowskis, are the duo behind such ground-breaking movies as The Matrix (1999) and Cloud Atlas (2012). Born to mother Lynne, a nurse, and father Ron, a businessman of Polish descent, Wachowski grew up in Chicago and formed a tight ...

Best film-The Matrix

Worst film-The Matrix Revolutions

65. Lilly Wachowski

Writer | The Matrix

Director, writer, and producer Lilly Wachowski was born in 1967 in Chicago, the daughter of Lynne, a nurse and painter, and Ron, a businessman. Lilly was educated at Kellogg Elementary School in Chicago, before moving on to Whitney M. Young High School. After graduating from high school, she ...

Best film-The Matrix

Worst film-The Matrix Revolutions

66. Wim Wenders

Director | Der Himmel über Berlin

Wim Wenders is an Oscar-nominated German filmmaker who was born Ernst Wilhelm Wenders on August 14, 1945 in Düsseldorf, which then was located in the British Occupation Zone of what became the Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany, known colloquially as West Germany until ...

Best film-Wings of Desire

Worst film-The End of Violence

67. Robert Wise

Director | West Side Story

Robert Earl Wise was born on September 10, 1914 in Winchester, Indiana, the youngest of three sons of Olive R. (Longenecker) and Earl Waldo Wise, a meat packer. His parents were both of Pennsylvania Dutch (German) descent. At age nineteen, the avid moviegoer came into the film business through an ...

Best film-The Sound of Music

Worst film-Star Trek: The Motion Picture

68. Terence Young

Director | Dr. No

Born in Shanghai and Cambridge-educated, Terence Young began in the industry as a scriptwriter. In the 1940s he worked on a variety of subjects, including the hugely popular wartime romance Suicide Squadron (1941), set to Richard Addinsell's rousing "Warsaw Concerto". His original story was devised...

Best film-From Russia with Love

Worth film-Inchon

69. Robert Zemeckis

Writer | Back to the Future

A whiz-kid with special effects, Robert is from the Spielberg camp of film-making (Steven Spielberg produced many of his films). Usually working with writing partner Bob Gale, Robert's earlier films show he has a talent for zany comedy (Romancing the Stone (1984), 1941 (1979)) and special effect ...

Best film-Back to the Future

Worst film-The Polar Express

70. Chloé Zhao

Director | Nomadland

Chloé Zhao or Zhao Ting (born March 31, 1982) is a Chinese film director, screenwriter, and producer. Her debut feature film, Songs My Brothers Taught Me (2015), premiered at Sundance Film Festival. Her second feature film, The Rider (2017), was critically acclaimed and received several accolades ...

Best film-Nomadland

Worst film-Eternals



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