Top 25 Film Directors

[Loki]

King Kong was far too long and boring. Yes it was spectacular, but it was poorly edited. Much like Jackson has done with The Hobbit films. Extending action sequences that don't need extended, adding scenes that don't add much to the plot or story. I think it is the poorest of the main three King Kong films. Even the 1933 version is far superior despite the plasticine Kong.

12 is probably too high for him, but I dare say he won't be the most over rated director on the list. *cough* Lucas *cough*

[19QOS19]

The Lovely Bones receiving a bit of unwarranted criticism IMO. I thought it was really nicely directed and the use of colour throughout the film was really well done. Also thought young Saoirse Ronan was superb in it. Was totally taken aback when I heard her in an interview, with such a strong Irish accent. Have kept an eye on her films since then.

I felt uncomfortable at times during the film. The main scene being when he had Susie in the underground den. I also cried and felt joy as well. Any film that makes me feel various emotions throughout, gets a thumbs up in my book.

I can see that some wouldn't really enjoy it but it is by no means a bad film. Anywhere even close to being bad IMO.

[Albino Rover]

11. Ken Loach

British cinema would be nothing without its authenticity and honesty about real life. It’s what British filmmakers do best, and of them all nobody has done it with more range and consistency over time than Ken Loach. As well as great admiration and respect, his many social and political films have earned him some powerful enemies, but those have only strengthened his drive to stand up for his beliefs and keep striving to make the films that the broadcasters are too scared to go near, and the studios deem not commercial enough to invest in.

He's also an important director visually. His films are prime examples of the importance of letting the camera hold back and allowing the content to play out and speak for itself. All his films are shot in sequence: no matter how much more expensive it is to repeatedly move to and from locations Loach believes the best way to film a story realistically is to shoot the events in chronological order. In doing so he often likes to surprise his actors for a genuine reaction at key moments in the film, and gives them great freedom and room for improvisation wherever possible. He frequently works with newcomers scouted personally by himself, many of whom have never been near a drama school, and he has an extremely rare understanding of those people, an ability to direct a cast of amateurs as effectively as professionals.

He was born in 1936, at the height of the social realist movement in art, a style that we see all over his work to this day. In an age of showbusiness masking all that’s genuine, it’s increasingly important and never-endingly refreshing to see a filmmaker like Ken Loach still getting his hands dirty and showing us on screen what life is really like. What makes it work is Loach's gift- a sensitive and sophisticated appreciation of ordinary life, both historical and current, and its tragedies, terrors and triumphs, but deeper than the content always lies an important historical, political or societal message which delivers the hardest blow.

After his National Service in the RAF he studied Law at Oxford University and while doing so performed comedy in the Oxford Revue, which tempted him out of Law and into theatre direction. He quickly moved on to television, directing a few episodes of Z-Cars and many issues of The Wednesday Play, including the iconic Cathy Come Home, whose powerful depiction of homelessness and the authorities' attitude towards it led directly to the foundation of the charity "Shelter", and eventually changes in homeless legislation.

His debut film for cinema release was Poor Cow, a close-to-the-bone drama about a barmaid becoming pregnant while in an unstable social situation. It was an interesting realist drama but also an important statement in the early stages of the women’s liberation movement, which became more prominent in the '70s. Loach's realism and daring was reminiscent of the European cinema he grew up with, as well as bearing similarities with the French New Wave of the time, and the film was well-received on the continent. It was also a surprise hit in America, where it was sold to distributors for more than the production budget.

After the success of his first film Loach was much more ambitious with his next. Kes is a profound story about a poor Yorkshire boy with a rough upbringing and tough paper round who, as he reaches school leaving age, finds escape in training and befriending a pet kestrel- a Summer of freedom and self-realisation before a lifetime down the pits. It’s a film about the early loss of innocence and freedom, the doomed bias of the education system against the working class and the definitive end of childhood, making it one of the most heartbreaking examples of realist British cinema of all time, particularly to its own generation who saw themselves in the boy's shoes. For 45 years Kes has been as important and influential as any other British masterpiece, and remains a monument of British culture as well as our film history.

His third film was Family Life, a grim character study of a young schizophrenic girl suffering a nervous breakdown, and her relationship with her uptight parents and doctors. It was a remake of one of Loach's Wednesday Plays, In Two Minds, and was another big success, both financially and critically.

After a very short time Loach was suddenly recognised as one of Britain's best and most famous young directors, admired for his principles and bringing social problems into his drama. He was hired to direct The Save The Children Fund Film, a documentary film, commissioned by Save The Children itself, to highlight the great work it was doing in Britain and in Africa. Loach visited one of the charity's institutions in Kenya and found that the standard of the children's treatment was in fact very poor: among other things the children were forbidden from some of their indigenous cultural practices and forced to speak English, even to one another. He put his findings in the film, and also cast a very negative light on the charity's employees' working conditions in Britain. Save The Children disowned the film, refused to pay Loach or his producer, Tony Garnett, and tried to destroy the negatives. It wasn't seen until 2011.

It's true that Loach showed great bravery not to be the charity's puppet but to stand up and do the right thing, even on someone else's dollar, but that came at a cost. The legal battle led to Loach and Garnett's brand new production company, Kestrel Films, almost going bankrupt, and the company didn't make another film until the end of the decade. Neither could Ken Loach- he had to take a step backwards, and returned to directing for television for eight years.

After several TV documentaries and episodes throughout the '70s Loach and Kestrel Films came back in 1979 with Black Jack, a children's fantasy film set in the countryside of 18th century Yorkshire, and The Gamekeeper, about a year in the life of a married man taking the title job after industrial redundancy, finding himself living at one with nature, but on the wrong side of a very obvious class divide. Both films quickly established Loach as never having lost his subtle visual style and talent for storytelling and, especially with The Gamekeeper, returning to realist social commentary.

He returned to urban affairs with Looks And Smiles, a love story between a young unemployed lad and a shoe shop girl in post-industrial Sheffield. Among the political factors the film focuses on the human impact of the situation, highlighting the boredom and simplicity of the hero's life, the repetitiveness and hopelessness of job-seeking, and the idealism of getting away from the dying city. Looks And Smiles voiced the frustrated thoughts of millions of British people but Loach cleverly voiced his own career concerns with his next film, Fatherland, the story of an East German songwriter who crosses the Berlin Wall looking for more musical freedom, but realises that Western capitalism can be as limiting to an artist as communism.

He only made three feature films in the 1980s but throughout the decade he became more politically active than before, campaigning against the Tories and making a number of documentaries, which he had to fight relentlessly to get commissioned and again to get broadcast, including the coal dispute film Which Side Are You On?, and Time To Go, about Britain's involvement in Northern Ireland, a subject on which he was just getting started.

Hidden Agenda is one of the most commercially appealing Ken Loach films across the Atlantic, partly because of its leading stars but also for its more conventional style. It's a thriller based around the investigation of a political murder in Ulster: unenlightened viewers will get caught in the genuinely gripping plot but those who know about The Troubles and the UK police scandals will take far more from its important message. Unfortunately that message was attacked and censored by much of the British media and critics, whose protests against the film included infiltrating the Cannes Film Festival to brand the true story "IRA propaganda".

The strong political message of Hidden Agenda was loud and clear, and Loach followed it with an equally important social statement. The film was Riff Raff- a study of the casual workers on a dodgy construction site, renovating a closed hospital into luxury flats in London, and the conflict between working class and management-class, within that background concentrating on a financially-challenged Scottish labourer and his dreamer, wannabe-singer girlfriend. The film's soft side shows plenty of labourer jokes and banter but ultimately it's a platform for a serious subject that had become a reality for millions of workers in the 1980s, and its conclusion is a testament to that seriousness.

Ken Loach has said that he supports the working class in his films because "by and large their stories don't get told, and if there is to be a political change, it has to come from the working class. And they have the best jokes." His next film was about a similar subject to Riff Raff, but told this time through the medium of comedy. Raining Stones focused on unemployment rather than under-employment, but showed the same desperate struggle, as well as the spirit and pride (and religion) that remained with many of the unemployed Thatcher-era working class. The plot follows an out-of-work father who struggles to buy a dress for his daughter's first communion, with lots of one-liners, situation and physical comedy and, despite the unravelling element of risk and threat of grave consequences to its hero, a general mood of optimism and community togetherness.

Riff Raff and Raining Stones were sure signs that Loach was able to transfer his important messages into interesting forms, but the humour is overshadowed by overwhelming, almost unbearable emotions in Ladybird Ladybird, an immense powerhouse drama which unravels a mother of four's heartbreaking experiences in tandem with her horrible past, ultimately asking a crucial question about its tragic heroine- is she her own worst enemy, or are the social services?

Emotional levels also run high in Land And Freedom, a heartbreaking retelling of the misguided passion and blind optimism of a group of socialists fighting in the Spanish Civil War. The greatness is in the characters- they are all likeable, ordinary people whose personalities and loyalties are tested as the impact of the war intensifies, and the strong emotional connection Loach establishes with those characters makes Land And Freedom one of the most heart-wrenching and philosophical war films of recent years. In the peripheral cast of the film was Paul Laverty, a screenwriter whose partnership with his director was just about to begin, in a new territory for Loach- Scotland.

Ken Loach made his first trip north of the border to direct Carla’s Song, the unforgettable story of a relationship between a Glaswegian bus driver and a troubled Nicaraguan refugee. As soon as we meet Carla we quickly see she's a distressed young woman, and begin to discover the details of her dreadful life as the film goes on a haunting journey with her, through the hell she grew up in before moving to Glasgow. It's a film in which Loach pulls no punches about either the emotions and experiences of the characters, or the UK government's lack of help for Carla, and the inhumanity and corruption that plagued Nicaragua during its revolution.

His next film was My Name Is Joe, set in a Glasgow council estate, about a recovering alcoholic living in a neighbourhood run by drugs and alcohol, and his relationship with a health visitor. Joe's life is a constant struggle- as well as being a recovering addict he's unemployed and poor, but he compensates for his own social situation with attempts to help others, to such an extent that he's taken advantage of- not by those he helps, but by their loan sharks and dealers. It's another Loach drama with a prominent comic vein through it, but its realism is unavoidably genuine, and its conclusion is both shocking and inevitable.

Loach's first works of the 21st century were a couple of films about one of his most passionate personal beliefs, the importance of workers’ rights. The first was a landmark for Loach, his first and only film in America, Bread And Roses, an optimistic but truthful film about the plight of a group of underpaid, mostly Mexican janitors who are helped by an eccentric Union representative. He returned to Britain with The Navigators, a statement about the effects of privatisation on a group of workers for the British Railway, and the declines in standards, working conditions and job security.

After a quick succession of films away from Scotland he came back with Sweet Sixteen, the tragic tale of a teenager in modern-day Greenock, whose only contact with his parents is visiting his mother in jail, and his only career option is to turn to crime himself. Helpless and frustrated, he dreams of, and strives for, a better life, but at the heart of the matter is the fact that right from the start Liam's upbringing gave him no chance in life, and that the first crime in his life was the one committed against him by society.

Politics and social issues make way for religious conflict in Ae Fond Kiss, a love story amongst a clash between Islam and Catholicism in 21st century Glasgow. The characters are more privileged socially than in other Loach films but their problems are all caused by deep-lying cultural differences: she can't work in her Catholic school because she's in an unmarried relationship with a Muslim man; he can't be with her because his parents have arranged his marriage, and amongst the relationship is his younger sister, a Scottish-Pakistani student at his girlfriend's Catholic school (and a Rangers fan), forbidden by her parents from following her dream of studying journalism. Ae Fond Kiss is a bold examination of the fine line between family values and religious intolerance, and the difficulties of these young people attempting to answer to a higher power.

Next came something different, one of Loach's most ambitious and original films. He was one of the three international directors of Tickets, a film told in three linked sections, telling the stories of several passengers on a train from Austria to Italy. Loach's section reunited him with the Sweet Sixteen trio of Martin Compston, Gary Maitland and William Ruane, playing a group of young Celtic fans on the way to a Champions' League match who, when they discover they're suddenly a ticket short, face an ethical dilemma. The film is not directly about action or plot but a political analogy, about characters from many different European backgrounds who interact and clash in unusual and interesting ways, differing completely in backgrounds, languages and motives but all going in the same direction.

In 2006 Ken Loach celebrated his 70th birthday, but still he took his filmmaking to a new level with the release of one of the most poignant war films and possibly his greatest film, The Wind That Shakes The Barley, a culturally and stylistically sensitive examination of 1920s Ireland, explaining the tensions and anger that forced a community of oppressed Irish civilians to join the Republican Army, and the differing impacts of the Irish War of Independence on its members, specifically a young doctor who abandons his profession to fight for his country, and his politically infamous and influential brother. It's an expressive war film, told at grassroots level, covering the politics of an important historical time for Ireland, all of which is woven seamlessly not just through the plot but carefully into the characters and the narrative. Predictably, it was panned by the British tabloids, but it was quickly uncovered that many of the film's negative reviews had come from writers who hadn't been seen at any of the critics' screenings, perhaps confirming that a portion of the media had a premeditated agenda with Loach and with the film's content with no intention of seeing it. In any case, those cynics' comments have no effect on the film's visual and emotional immediacy, fluency, strength and beauty, or the fact that it's a modern masterpiece.

After his historical marvel, he returned dutifully to current matters with his next film, It’s A Free World, a story of a young employment agent in London, who tries to take advantage of new immigrants to Britain while struggling with her own personal and family problems, but is faced with a dilemma of "greed or good" as she learns both how to exploit immigrants and how she could help some of them. Released at a very appropriate time for its plot content, the film highlighted the working and living conditions of some of these people living in the UK, being treated like animals as they're herded into Transit vans to their dodgy workplaces, and the ease with which some employers seem to be able to screw over illegal immigrants. It was also noticeably the first Ken Loach film in decades to be set in the South of England.

In 2007 the Cannes Film Festival commissioned the special film To Each His Own Cinema- a collection of 3-minute films made by a great range of directors from 25 countries, each of whom was invited to portray "their state of mind of the moment as inspired by the motion picture theatre". Ken Loach's effort, "Happy Ending", showed a father and son deciding which film to see on a Saturday afternoon while in the queue at the cinema. It's only three minutes long but it is a charming and enlightening snapshot of Loach's view of the medium of which he's a master, and with that in mind it's perhaps no surprise that his next film was as bright and imaginative as Looking For Eric.

The story is about a depressed father whose life is reinvigorated by the intervention of his workmates, and (possibly drug-fuelled) visions of his footballing hero. At first glimpse there doesn't seem to be any significant danger in Eric's life, the worst evil being his two lazy sons, but when one of them starts getting tickets and lifts to Man Utd matches and is bought a new strip, things begin to get suspicious. Like all the Loach films Looking For Eric depicts, among other things, the mood and social circumstances of a generation, but primarily it's a good-natured film about friendship and dealing with demons together, not alone, as well as, on a bigger scale than previously, its director's love of football.

The following year came Route Irish, a conspiracy thriller about an investigation against a private military security contractor following the suspicious death of a British soldier in Iraq. In some ways it's an "unconventional" Ken Loach film, with much more thrills, action and gunfire than even his previous war films but, as with all his work, the violence is completely justified as part of the story, depicting the sheer danger of the Route, and in no way gratuitous. It's also one of the most serious messages he's attempted, uncovering some of the unresolved conflict that went unmentioned, and hinting at mysteries even deeper, darker and bigger than those seen in the film, even drawing similarities to his previous controversial work, asking questions of Tony Blair that Hidden Agenda asked of Margaret Thatcher.

His latest visit to Scotland was to direct The Angels’ Share, a comedy about friendship, redemption and the difficulty of getting over a troubled past. In the film we meet a group of young people doing community service who, just like Liam in Sweet Sixteen, had no chance in life, but when Robbie becomes a father with a girl from a more affluent background, she won't let her child suffer, and her father doesn't want Robbie around his grandchild. What ensues is a challenge for a young man and his friends to pool their talents and achieve their potential, by fair means or foul. The main characters in all the Loach films have to fight for simple things like a job, a second chance or to be with their loved ones. Robbie is fighting for all three.

His most recent film was The Spirit Of '45- a documentary about post-War Britain, chronicling interviews and images in a mood that was sentimental and nostalgic rather than scornful or overly-political. Loach kept it simple in attempt to reminisce about the good days, but the film hints (hardly subtly) that over the last 70 years we haven't done those days, or the Beveridge Report, anywhere near enough justice.

He turns 78 later this year but he's still as hard-working and enthusiastic as ever- he was recently able to combine his passion for Britain's workers' rights with his love of cinema by campaigning for the right for workers at a small English cinema chain to be represented by a media trade union, and his next film, Jimmy's Hall, will première next month at Cannes.

After a career like that you'd forgive the man for being a grumpy old man and retiring with immediate effect, but he's still out there, as keen and energetic as ever about his art, planning where he will take his extraordinary talents next. A pioneer, icon and ambassador of British cinema, this man is surely our most heroic and courageous film director, with undying principles and an unwavering loyalty to them, no matter what the costs. In the past we've seen him censored, silenced and slandered but through it all he's always fought both for his films and for his political beliefs, and even now, pestered by those who try to ban violence and language from his films, continues to fight the authorities to keep crowd-pleasing fantasy out of slice-of-life drama. This is real cinema. This is real life. Long may Ken Loach remain a testament to it.

[WhiteRoseKillie]

Ah - My top pick. I was beginning to despair of seeing his name at all. Credit to anyone who voted for him and thanks, AR, for the cracking write-up.

I may be an old dinosaur, but you can keep your CGI and the rest - give us stories. Make us laugh, cry, get angry, swell with pride and bristle with indignation. These, and more, Ken Loach can do with ease.

Land and Freedom is one of only a couple of films guaranteed to make me tear up.

All in all, a man who has stayed true to his principles, and has given us better films for doing so.

[Bold Rover]

Excellent composition again from the unpigmented one. That's another of my top ten in the bottom fifteen, however. Enjoying the unveiling of the picks of the P&B community.

[Rabbi Williams]

My number 1! Best film director that's ever lived.

[WhiteRoseKillie]

My number 1! Best film director that's ever lived.

A kindred spirit. Well said Sir.

[alsy]

Ah - My top pick. I was beginning to despair of seeing his name at all. Credit to anyone who voted for him and thanks, AR, for the cracking write-up.

I may be an old dinosaur, but you can keep your CGI and the rest - give us stories. Make us laugh, cry, get angry, swell with pride and bristle with indignation. These, and more, Ken Loach can do with ease.

Land and Freedom is one of only a couple of films guaranteed to make me tear up.

All in all, a man who has stayed true to his principles, and has given us better films for doing so.

My number 1! Best film director that's ever lived.

Mine too.

Another excellent write-up from AR.

[WhiteRoseKillie]

Mine too.

Another excellent write-up from AR.

Three of us putting him in at Number One - cue the Freddie Mercury meme.

I honestly thought that once we got past fifteen I was going to be going on a lonely rant as to how the youth of today have been seduced by big budgets and technology.

I might still do, mind....

[Co.Down Hibee]

Amazingly still none of mine have been mentioned yet.

[Caveman]

I'm not familiar with most of his films (I think I've only seen Angel's Share, which was excellent) but he sounds like a brilliant human being. I'll definitely need to give some of his others a watch. Cheers for the write-up AR.

[WhiteRoseKillie]

I'm not familiar with most of his films (I think I've only seen Angel's Share, which was excellent) but he sounds like a brilliant human being. I'll definitely need to give some of his others a watch. Cheers for the write-up AR.

Raining Stones, Riff Raff, Land and Freedom or Looking for Eric would all make good starting points.

If it's his moral dimension which attracts, you'll be glad to know that his son Jim has followed in the family tradition with Oranges and Sunshine, a cracking vehicle for Emily Watson. Well worth seeking out.

[AberdeenBud]

Aye, not seen any of these films apart from Kes.

Great write up again AR, will endeavour to watch a couple.

[Bold Rover]

Amazingly still none of mine have been mentioned yet.

Really? Are you (like I) awaiting the director from Co. Wicklow?

[Co.Down Hibee]

Really? Are you (like I) awaiting the director from Co. Wicklow?

I think in all honesty most of my choices will be top 10 with a couple that won't be in it ,at all,

[Albino Rover]

10. David Fincher

A perfectionist in every sense, right from his earliest work this director has always had an extremely precise visual style and an intense shooting style. He's a director who's sure of exactly what he wants long before beginning shooting and strives to get it right no matter what it costs. He’s known for long productions and exhausting his casts and crews with innumerable takes, but his track record speaks for itself- he always gets results.

His style is very strong and distinctive: even those less keen on some of his films' content can't deny the allure of the dim lighting, deep focus and attention to detail woven into their rich cinematic fabric. He's a stickler for authenticity but also accuracy about everything in the frame, crafting the setting to reflect the location and time of the story.

He also, crucially, knows exactly how to play his audience. All the Fincher films grip of the viewer from the start; sometimes even before a word is spoken with his creative title sequences. He gets the knife in early with the introduction, before twisting it mercilessly with the action.

Like many of the directors of the his generation, David Fincher started his foray into filmmaking as a child, filming home movies on Super 8mm, and caught the bug from there. He didn’t go to film school, instead starting work on as many set jobs as he could get, originally as a camera assistant, learning his trade on the job and building up his experience as much as possible. He went on to work for the visual effects company ILM in the early '80s and eventually got his first directing jobs on T.V. ads and music videos. He soon became one of the best in the latter field, directing videos for artists including Madonna, Aerosmith and Michael Jackson, and was one of the many founding directors of the music video and indie film company Propaganda Films.

His big break came after original director Vincent Ward pulled out of production of Alien 3. Fincher was offered the directing job essentially because he was able to work at short notice; the film was already well into pre-production stage when he came on board but even though he was drafted in late he was passionate about developing his own vision of a bigger and more life-threatening adventure than the film's predecessors. He was left frustrated, though, being overruled by his executives on most of the major decisions; at the time Alien 3 was the highest-budget debut film for a director, and because they had a rookie the producers simply didn't trust him to call the shots.

After the huge success of the original Alien and the first sequel, number 3 was a great disappointment. Fincher himself was the film’s harshest critic, cursing what the studio had done to his work without his consent and later completely disowning the film. A rough idea of the director's cut has since been released, and although it's considered something of a saving grace Fincher wanted nothing to do with it. But it had a positive effect on him- one of the biggest learning curves for any director is their first film; maybe it toughened him up, and it's because of his experiences on Alien 3 that Fincher has become one of the most tenacious and perfectionistic directors around.

As Fincher said himself, "There are movies that make money and there are movies that are worth money." Alien 3 made a profit - it's in the first category - but even before returning over ten times its budget, his next film belonged to the latter.

Seven is a serial killer thriller about the conflicting world views of two homicide detectives, one a young man with a wife and dogs, and one in his last week before retirement, who has been around the block a few times more and seen its horrors a few times too many. It’s a compelling and unforgiving journey through hell, bound by the tension and inevitability of the murder count reflecting the title. In directing the film David Fincher came into his own dark element, pulling out all the tricks and techniques of an old master with lighting, suspense, colour temperature and editing, all mounting up to a torturous conclusion.

His next film was The Game, an intricate thriller about a wealthy divorced man in need of an adventure, so much that on his 48th birthday he signs up for one, but rather than simple recreation the adventure takes over his life. He finds himself in strange and increasingly dangerous situations, becoming growingly unsure about whether or not what he sees is really a game or an intricate con, and that's what whole film plays on: our own perception of reality. Just as the hero is manipulated by the Game, we are manipulated by Fincher’s confusing narrative and visual trickery, and the plot is left ambiguous and unexplained right up until the film’s closing minutes.

The first rule about his fourth film is: you do not talk about it.

The second rule about his fourth film is: you do not talk about it.

It's Fight Club.

A psychologically complicated thriller, twisted and shaped into social satire, mystery, action and black comedy. With dark elements and controversial content (including instructions on making dynamite) as well as an air of confidence and coolness, and a legendary twist, it's one of the most iconic films of the decade but also, in a breakthrough period of technological achievement, one of the most accomplished; stylised by more of David Fincher's visual trickery and digitally enhanced with use of microscopic CGI and fluid tracking camera, with a theme of mysterious single frame inserts throughout.

Fight Club is one of the defining films of David Fincher's career, and of '90s cult cinema, complete with bloody, masculine violence:

macabre physical comedy:

and its director's own humour with his last subliminal message to the audience:

(which Brad Pitt claimed was Fincher's cameo.)

He entered the 21st century with the swift, energetic, claustrophobic Panic Room. For Fincher it was a cautious step into the mainstream but as much as it's a crowd-pleasing stranger-in-the-house thriller, the aesthetic and entertainment value of the film is through the roof, with Fincher and his cinematography crew creating something quite extraordinary to watch with a range of camera movements and animated photography. It was a logistical nightmare to film almost the entire movie inside a town house at night, but the results are extremely rewarding.

Around the time of the release of Panic Room filmmaking was going through one of its biggest revolutions. For the first time directors had an alternative to shooting on film stock, and digital cinematography was being used in the mainstream to make feature films. Ever since there has been great debate between the two, and Fincher has pledged his allegiance to video. He wanted to shoot Panic Room in digital but although the technology had already become available, it was still being developed and perfected. After completing Panic Room he didn't want to make another movie until digital had been advanced to a high enough standard, and as such he didn't direct a film for 5 years.

His first film in digital was the 2007 mystery-drama Zodiac. The film recounts the story of the San Francisco murders of the late '60s and '70s as though we're watching the case unravel first-hand, but rather than focusing solely on the details of the investigation Zodiac goes deeper into the mind of the cartoonist attracted to the case by the intrigue of the murderer's cryptic clues sent to his newspaper, and how over 22 years what started as a pastime becomes an obsession, a part of his and his family's life. As well as the film's character focus it's one of Fincher's best-looking films: shooting in video fits his style perfectly, not just because he can shoot a scene 40 times without wasting film, but for the deep, clean look he spent five years waiting for, which now defines his style.

The following year came one of his most ambitious projects, something completely different to the films he'd become famous for, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button. It's a big film which on release split audiences- some were bored, some were blown away, but there's no denying that it's technically masterful: from make-up to special effects David Fincher's crew somehow made Benjamin's unnatural backward ageing look absolutely genuine. The rest of Fincher's direction is just as special, in particular the soft, rich lighting and the rhythm and pacing of the narrative, which is especially difficult when describing the passage of time. The film may be a statement about the complications of life and the inevitability of death but at its centre it's a fantasy film of moments- and there are some magic ones.

He opened the current decade with the already iconic The Social Network, a slick and intellectual biography of a 21st century billionaire. As well as a thick-and-fast, dialogue-heavy story it's a technical tour-de-force: very, very few films match Fincher's sheer instinct in terms of pacing- all his films are watchable because of their rhythm and narrative but, in that respect at least, The Social Network is his technical showcase piece, with the story told and the characters developed so quickly and intensely alongside the stellar visual work that although the audience can follow everything that happens, we have to make some of the connections after the facts.

And that's part of its genius. We're thrown in at the deep end and right from the start it's seemingly endless in plot and conversation; fancy camera work and flashy editing, until reaching a moment of clarity when we realise what the protagonist's riches really mean to him. It's also perhaps the most pronounced example of one of the ongoing themes in a few of Fincher's films- a commentary on the digital age where technology, information and data are taking over our lives, but also increasing our possibilities.

His most recent feature film was his own version of Niels Arden Oplev's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Largely faithful to both Stieg Larsson's novel and the original film adaptation, with some Hollywood-influenced differences, this film develops the entertainment and excitement of a classic murder plot with a modern twist, and a strong emotional connection with the lead character, her troubled past, and her own vengeance story. Adapted, filmed and paced in a manner that's both dark and graceful, it's directed in a different style from, say, The Social Network, but to the same impeccable standard.

Having worked on music videos, commercials and feature films, last year Fincher turned for the first time to television, directing the first two episodes of House Of Cards as well as serving as an executive producer on the series. Every Fincher fan wants to see him complete the Millennium trilogy- he has been reluctant to comment on the possibility of that happening, but has confirmed his own interest in the idea. It certainly won't be before his adaptation of the best-selling novel Gone Girl, which has been completed and hits cinemas in October.

Thick, fast and free-flowing, Fincher's films are among the best work of his generation. He has film direction down to a fine art, but also treats it as educationally and experimentally as a science, and at 51 he still has decades to continue pushing limits and producing masterpieces. He is, of course, a visual technician who has created a personalised brand of precision-engineered cinema, but in doing that he's always kept his films smart, cool and accessible.

In particular he's a favourite among the current crop of young filmmakers who grew up with his early work, and their appreciation and admiration of him makes it worth mentioning that not only has David Fincher been one of the most consistent and successful directors of the last twenty years but he's already become one of the most influential directors over the next generation.

[Co.Down Hibee]

Great write up, some brilliant films in there,Seven is superb as is the Game which is one of those under the radar films that should get much more recognition than it does. Same could be said for Panic Room.

[AberdeenBud]

Personally I love finch.

Fight Club and Seven would be both be pushing my top ten films of all time, absolutely stunning movies.

[Al B]

I didn't get votes in in time, but Fincher would have been my top pick.

On a side note, thoroughly enjoying these write-ups, and have already directed me towards some films I had never seen, and some directors who's work I wasn't familiar with.

[Honest_Man#1]

Yeah I'm the same as above, meant to vote but completely forgot but he would have been my #1. Seven is my favourite film, Fight Club is one if my all time favourites too and I've not seen a Fincher film I've not enjoyed, he's class.