Best Director Decades

60 years ago today, Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train premiered, the second movie he made in what would be an incredible 1950’s for him, and his first great movie of the decade (Sorry, Stage Fright).  Indeed, Hitchcock’s work in the 50’s will go down as one of the best decades a director has ever had, but has anyone since outdone him?  Starting in the 50’s, I picked one director from each decade who had the most impressive overall collection of work, and then sorted them from worst to best.  Some of the calls were harder than others, as I’m sure some of them will be more disputed than others, but overall, it’s a pretty good list of directors.

6: 1990’s Terry Gilliam

Let’s just get this one out of the way first, since I know this is going to be the least popular of any of my picks, and probably deserves to be.  Honestly, the 90’s were an excellent decade for movies, maybe the best, but no single director stood out.  As I looked through my options, all I could see were director’s who had two very good or great movies, but dropped off after that.  Don’t believe me?  Check this out:  Spielberg had Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan, Cameron had Terminator 2 and Titanic, Scorsese had Goodfellas and Casino, Tarantino had Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs, Darabont had The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, The Coen brothers had Fargo and The Big Lebowski, Fincher had Se7en and Fight Club, you could even make an argument for Paul Thomas Anderson with Boogie Nights and Magnolia.  So why did I pick Gilliam?  Why not?  I really think his 12 Monkeys is as good as any other movie of the 90’s.  He only made two other movies in the 90’s: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, a cult classic, and The Fisher King, an overlooked movie that’s definitely better than it has gotten credit for.  His movies haven’t been commercially popular; they’re hard to watch, not because they have particularly dark or disturbing content, but because they seem a little unpolished, a feeling that sometimes makes them feel a little too unreal and other times makes them feel far too real.  As far as I’m concerned, a good argument could be made for a lot of these directors, and I wouldn’t necessarily disagree, but I’m making mine for Gilliam.

5: 1980’s Steven Spielberg

Spielberg, along with the next entry on our list, almost befell the same fate as Martin Scorsese: a great life’s work pretty evenly divided between several decades, with no single one being impressive enough to earn a spot on the list.  Luckily for Spielberg, there wasn’t a whole lot of competition in the 80’s, so he’s able to sneak in here with a solid decade of work in the 80’s.  His best work came at the beginning of the decade with Raiders of the Lost Ark in 1981 and E.T. in 1982.  The next several years were very solid, though certainly not legendary.  His two follow-ups in the Indiana Jones’ series were good but not as great as the original, and Empire of the Sun and The Color Purple were not a bad way to fill out the decade.  He did have the less than impressive Always, but that premiered 9 days before the end of the decade, so maybe we’ll just let that slide.

4: 1960’s Stanley Kubrick

In my opinion, the 1960’s really came down to Kubrick and Sergio Leone.  They both had two very good movies (Spartacus and Lolita for Kubrick and Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More for Leone), and two classics (Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove and 2001: A Space Odyssey and Leone’s The Good the Bad and the Ugly and Once Upon a Time in the West).  Quite frankly, I think of those eight, Leone’s are probably better, but Kubrick gets big points for versatility, which I think gives him the edge.  All of Leone’s movies fit the epic “spaghetti” western mold, and three of the four are from the “Man with No Name Trilogy.”  Kubrick’s movies, on the other hand, include a science fiction classic, a dark comedy, a  novel adaptation, and a historical action adventure film.  In the end I think both would be good picks, but I’m glad Kubrick made it on here, because in my opinion his four best movies spanned four different decades.  His two most influential movies, however, may both have come out of the 60’s.

3: 2000’s Christopher Nolan

There’s no present-day director who’s consistently turning out mind-blowing movies like Christopher Nolan.  His worst movie of the decade was the very watchable Insomnia.  Other than that, he’s succeeded in somehow resurrecting the Batman franchise that 1997’s Batman & Robin buried deep underground.  He also crafted his breakout masterpiece Memento, which in my mind is still the best movie of the decade.  Finally, he brought us The Prestige, which despite largely being overlooked in its time, (probably due to its unfortunate release a few weeks after the much less impressive The Illusionist) is perhaps the most profound of any of his works.  Forget about the magic and the plot twists: is there any better movie in recent history that depicts the dangers of obsession? (Okay, maybe There Will Be Blood, but can you name a second?)  Nolan is also the only director on this list who’s under 60 (he’s only 40) and presumably has a long life of directing in front of him.  Recently, he’s turned his attention more towards summer blockbusters, which may make his fans wonder if he risks one day becoming a sellout. Although his most recent movie, Inception, certainly doesn’t put him in that category, once you get past the incredible premise, it really doesn’t hold together as strongly as any of his other movies.  Hopefully Nolan still has another decade or two left in him like the 2000’s.

2: 1950’s Alfred Hitchcock

It’s hard to keep Hitchcock from the number one spot on this list, but I’ll save why he’s not quite number one for the next entry and instead focus on why he is up this high.  For one thing, he turned out three indisputable classics in Rear Window, Vertigo, and North by Northwest.   Add to that two great movies in Strangers on a Train and Dial M for Murder, and 6 other movies, not all of which I can admit to have watched, but none of which I can describe as anything less than good.  If more of this list’s emphasis was placed on quantity, Hitchcock would be an easy number one, and even on quality, he has a very good argument for it.  I’ll be the first to admit that I tend not to be impressed by older movies, and certainly don’t give them the respect they may receive from a source like AFI (Notice how this list only goes back to the 50’s), but even I can appreciate the genius of Hitchcock’s works from decades before my birth.  Certainly a decade for the ages.

1: 1970’s Francis Ford Coppola

Coppola’s run in the 1970’s is so interesting for so many different reasons.  It’s true, Hitchcock had more movies that I would consider great in the 50’s than Coppola had in total in the 70’s, but I could honestly argue for any of three of Coppola’s movies (The Godfather, The Godfather: Part II, and Apocalypse Now) as the greatest film ever made.  Could I argue that about any of Hitchcock’s?  Maybe Vertigo, but I’m not sure I’d be able to convince anyone, including myself.  The Godfather really doesn’t require me to make an argument on its behalf, considering how many different times and by how many different sources it has already been declared the greatest movie of all time, or close to it.  It’s sequel requires a little more defense, but considering how many people truly believe it’s better than the first, all that’s needed is a little transitivity and the argument makes itself.  Then there’s Apocalypse Now, with its entirely unique combination of unparalleled cinematographic magnificence and deeply haunting look into the human condition.  It somehow manages to take the concept of Heart of Darkness to an entirely new realm that’s even darker and more disturbing, but at the same time upsettingly relatable and understandable.  Coppola made one other movie in the decade, The Conversation, which was no slouch, having won the Palme d’Or at Cannes and having been nominated for best picture, which it lost to pretty good movie called The Godfather: Part II.  Coppola’s run in the 70’s was so impressive that he’s often mentioned as one of the greatest directors of all time despite never having made a particularly good movie in any other decade.  No one can say the Coppola never reached his potential, but it is a little sad how short his reign was.