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By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com

What Defines The Quality Of A Director?

In another thread, a comparison about “what makes one director worse than another” started up. And so, for all of you… the question.
Can you compare Brett Ratner, who makes big, fat studio monstrosities, and Kevin Smith or Jim Jarmusch, who make personally driven films? Is it how the movie looks or how the movie feels? Is it the effect or the performances?
How do you make the comparison

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91 Responses to “What Defines The Quality Of A Director?”

  1. ployp says:

    I don’t compare directors. I don’t know how to. I just believe (falsely sometimes) that one is better than the other.
    Sometimes I hate the idea of the director as the auteur, as the person responsible for the whole movie. I wonder how that thinking began. But then again, I don’t really know what happens on a film set. What does a director actually do? What is the extent of his/her responsibility on set?
    I find myself liking movies for their story. Is that the responsibility of the director or the writer/s? And the tone? Is it the editor’s credit? And what do producers and executive directors do?
    Sorry for the questions. But I really don’t know the extent of their respective responsibilities.

  2. jeffmcm says:

    I always say ‘never let a story get in the way of making a good movie’.

  3. jeffmcm says:

    But seriously, I think comparisons are unavoidable, they just depend on your criteria. If you think discussions of oral sex is inherently a bad thing, you’re doing to rank Kevin Smith pretty lower as a filmmaker. If you think human emotion is a good thing, Ratner drops like a rock. All depending on the individual.
    The director’s role has a wide range, Ployp. Some (Kubrick, Mann, Hitchcock) have more control than others.

  4. Nicol D says:

    I think the discussions are fine, and necessary, so long as you ae comparing two people who are roughly at the same place in their game.
    A comparison of Truffaut Vs. Bergman is appropriate just as may be a comparison of early Spielberg to current Syamalan.
    The Smith vs Ratner game I think is also relevant (and fun).
    Different directors have different criteria and I also think the debates force us (film fans and critics) to try to determine a benchmark of what is good or not.
    How do we know Ratner is not very good at big blockbusters…because we know what a young Spielberg would have done in his position.
    The irony of course is not lost that Spielberg created the Ratner monster…but that is another story.

  5. Arrow77 says:

    I think the quality that makes a director better than others is the amount of passion that he can communicate. Some directors have been called “ambitious” but had no other ambition than to be called ambitious. Others, like Spielberg and Tarantino, have been able to make masterpieces with paper thin material only because their passion for it was sincere.

  6. Eric says:

    The quality of a director is determined by his ability to get on screen the movie he wanted to make. This means he coaxes the appropriate performance from the actors, he controls the camera in the appropriate way… everything.
    (This assumes the “auteur” theory is in effect, and the director makes the ultimate decisions on editing, music, etc.)
    In other words: How well can he command the tools at his disposal?

  7. mutinyco says:

    I think ultimately what makes a director are two things:
    1) The ablity to define himself and use the tools and understanding of his era in a manner than establishes himself in some measure of quality.
    2) Infleunce: does the director’s work hold up in the long run and can the touches he brought to the medium continue to inspire and reverberate?
    Anything more than that is subjective taste.

  8. Nicol D says:

    Of course the irony is that now more than ever I think there are very few directors who can claim to be the ‘author’ of their films.
    Ironically, K Smith is one of the few who can. Most are just employees of a large corporation commissioned to do a job.
    I love Pirate of The Carribbean, but Verbinski is no auteur…he is putting together a high end big mac. Nothing wrong with that, but I do think we are coming onto a time where the ‘a film by blank’ moniker needs to be rethought.
    Is X-3 a Brett Ratner film? No. It is a film by the 2oth Century Fox Corporation.
    Is Spike Jonze the author of his films or Charlie Kauffman?
    Is Michael Bay an auteur or just a high and go-to man for summer action when the studio already knows what it wants?
    There are very few directors who I would say author their films although all believe they do.
    Spielberg, Lucas, Clooney, Gibson, Cronenberg, Scorsese, Eastwood, Smith, Tarantino, and some others. That to me is a true auteur. Love’em or hate, when I see a film with one of their names on it as director I know I am getting a singular vision.
    Guys like Fincher, Jonze, Bay etc. I see more as directors as stylist. I am a Fincher fan but is he an auteur? Do I know anything about his worldview other than he loves cool lighting and dark atmosphere?
    I think there needs to be a re-evaluation of what it means to be a film director and who gets the “A Film by” tag on the credit block.
    I love Chris Nolan, but how much of Batman is Goyers vision. Goyer certainly has more experience than Nolan with comics.
    All things to consider.

  9. mutinyco says:

    I agree that most directors are hired stylists. That said…where do you put Tim Burton?…

  10. Nicol D says:

    Personally, I think Burton is an auteur. He does have a definite world view (somewhat nihilistic, based in Goth but with a glimmer of hope).
    I like Burton a lot actually although some of his recent work is not up to snuff.

  11. lazarus says:

    Burton may be an auteur, but he’s a rather infantile one.
    I don’t know that I’d call Eastwood an auteur simply because he doesn’t really have a discernable style, and doesn’t write his scripts or collaborate on them. Hitchcock wasn’t a screenwriter, but he sought out his own material and always shaped it to his needs and interests. Would you know a Clint film was his if he wasn’t in it?
    I’m not saying he hasn’t made great films. But an auteur? Not really.

  12. mutinyco says:

    Most directors should be thought of more as conductors rather than composers.
    Coppola (Francis that is) once suggested an “auteur” was somebody who directed what they wrote. That makes sense. Cause to consider Spielberg an auteur, great director he is, would be a miss. Yes, he has written his scripts on occasion, but he’d be the first to tell you he doesn’t believe in the auteur theory; for him, filmmaking is a collaborative effort. I think he would feel more comfortable with the “conductor” description.
    At best it can be argued that it depends film by film whether a director is the composer or conductor, and that the auteur term should be used more narrowly.
    This might be a controversial way of putting it. But using this description, Scorsese was the composer of Mean Streets, but merely the conductor of Taxi Driver.

  13. Tofu says:

    Quality directors? Don’t know.
    Iconic directors? Easy. Signatures! Signature lighting and actors are the two easiest points to remember. An iconic director is the type that will catch your eye as you flip television channels, turning to a movie, and then knowing instantly who was in charge without ever seeing the film before.
    Fincher clearly strikes me as an auteur. His films have a constant signature of evil and the limits of human morality.
    Spielberg indeed bases a good deal of his work on novels, yet could anyone honestly create the same visions as he has at the end of the day? Only JJ Abrhams comes close (see the escape from the HQ sequence in MI:III and tell me that wasn’t pure Spielberg).

  14. Monco says:

    I believe that in the end the movie that is made is utlimately the director’s vision. He should get the blame or the praise. Charlie Kauffman said that Clooney butchered his script for Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. Adaptation and Being John Malcovich were good because of Spike Jonze.
    Also, I totally believe you can compare big budget directors to more independent or small directors. Sam Raimi and Chris Nolan are perfect examples of this. No matter how big the budget Spider-Man 2 and Batman Begins were two of the best movies of their respective years.It can still be art. Batman Begins is great, X3 is dog shit.

  15. Lota says:

    One doesn’t have to write what one directs to have a discernible/unique stamp on a movie. John Ford sometimes had to do 5 movies a year, working for “the man” and still he put his Stamp on movies. He didn;t write the Searchers or My Darling Clementine, but they are every bit Ford movies. It’s amazing what he was able to do with the limitations he had. Same thing with Howard Hawks and many others. One can be independent within “the system”, at least if one is smart.
    This from IMDB (IMDB has accumulated many minor mistakes so I cannot vouch for every “factoid” in this writeup):
    “Hawks was unique and uniquely modern in that, despite experiencing his career peak in an era dominated by studios and the producer system in which most directors were simply hired hands brought in to shoot a picture, he also served as a producer and developed the scripts for his films. Hawks was determined to remain independent and refused to attach himself to a studio, or to a particular genre, for an extended period of time. His work ethic allowed him to fit in with the production paradigms of the studio system, and he eventually worked for all eight of the major studios. He proved himself to be, in effect, an independent filmmaker, and thus was a model for other director-writer-producers who would arise with the breakdown of the studio system in the 1950s and 1960s and the rise of the director as auteur in the early 1970s. Hawks did it first, though, in an environment that ruined or compromised many another filmmaker. Hawks was not interested in creating a didactic cinema but simply wanted to tell give the public a good story in a well-crafted, entertaining picture.”
    I think there are fewer auteurs Now than during the old studio system period. There are many more stylists though, at present, masquerading as Originals because they have the advantage that many out there haven;t seen the original movies their lifting directly from.
    Tarantino is a stylist. I could never see him as an auteur. he has always freely credited his directorial influences and he is merely a SUM of their parts. He has IMUHO done no cohesive unique vision to warrant calling him an auteur. People who do call him that, usually have not seen the 14 or so films that directly are influencing his scenic styles, his writing, his entire “look”. The poeple he credits/emulates did it effectively, better, more uniquely. i love Jackie Brown, I think his best movie, but there is nothing unique there. It’s merely a modern model–like a good remake.
    Michael Mann on the other hand credits many of the same sources as Tarantino, yet unlike Tarantino his movies are Mann and don;t belong to Melville + Shinoda + Fukusaku. From Thief to the present he isn;t paying homage, he’s just being himself.
    But those are my own stupid opinions.
    I also don;t think someone has to be an “auteur” to make a great entertaining movie, and many auteurs have made movies I absolutely HATE.
    many big dumb movies are great fun which means to me they are “good” movies. Nothing wrong with that.

  16. Lota says:

    so I guess I am trying to say whether small, big, studio or independent, auteur or entertainment hack–if it is a good time, provocative…then it is a worthwhile movie.
    Most good movies find their audience eventually, especially in this age of the internet.

  17. Jimmy the Gent says:

    I happen to think Verbinski might the first director to “get” Spielberg’s light touch. Guys like Zemeckis, Cameron, and Jackson practice Spielberg’s style of spectacke, but they’re not the lightest guys around. Even something as fun as Roger Rabbit feels like work at times.
    Verbinski knows he’s making a mass-appeal crowd-pleaser with the Pirates movies. The joy in Pirates 2 comes from his ability to throw away one-shot gags that crack you up. The “canibal island” sequence is a perfect example. It’s like Temple of Doom writ small. I predict (and hope) verbinski could turn out to be a major filmmaker.
    That’s what is so exciting about the movies. Great movies can come from anyone, even Ratner.
    For some directors being able to tell there stories is all they need. In the 12 years since Clerks, Smith has still not learned to frame a shot. Luckily for him his stories don’t require elaborate tracking shots, crane shots, dolly shots, or any of the hallmarks of other directors. His movies depend on dialogue. He does seem to be painfully aware at times that his visual style hasn’t changed. Did Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back really need to be shot in widescreen by Vilmos Zsgmond? Probably not. At least he tried, though. The point is what makes a great director is what they feel is most important in telling their stories. I do feel some people are tiring of Smith’s brand of shock humor. What was once startling in your early 20s now feels a little like desperation in your 30s. To put it another way, the “snowball” monologue in Clerks 1 was shocking. The donkey sequence in Clerks 2 was predictable.

  18. jeffmcm says:

    Spielberg might not like to call himself an auteur, but his films are almost all linked together thematically. When watching a Spielberg movie, you feel like you’re in his head, in his heart. That describes an auteur to me.
    I also don’t think that the quality of a director can be discerned by ‘the ability to get on the screen the movie that he wanted to make’. This presupposes that a director’s vision was worth watching/making in the first place.

  19. Me says:

    Whether a director is a stylist or auteur, I believe they all have a big hand in dealing with writers and actors, creating mood and tone, and ultimately I’m trying to see if I like/enjoy/ppreciate their visions.
    Also, a director only matters to me when I have a body of work to evaluate him or her. Three examples: I’ve hated Kevin Smith’s last three movies and animated show – I’m staying away from his new movie no matter how good anyone says it is. Spielberg’s work is hit or miss with me – I’ll decide whether to see it based on the trailer and reviews. Cameron’s work has always hit me hard – no matter what it is, I’m going to see it.
    That’s as important as a director comes to me as a consumer.

  20. hcat says:

    To the Person above who doesn’t see a unifying thread in Eastwood’s work, I always find his films as being about an outsider trying to find a place in the world. Even in his popcorn movies like the Gauntlet and the Rookie (there must be fifty reasons why I shouldn’t love that movie but right now I cant think of one) the leads are men trying to prove something to themselves. In movies Eastwood has not directed he has been willing to play the invincible supercop in the vein of Arnold or Seagal but in movies he makes himself he usually has a flawed hero on a journey of self-discovery.
    On another topic, based on the criteria listed above about a director being succesful by getting their vision onscreen, does this mean that Chris Columbus is no longer a hack? I have no doubt that the end result of Mrs. Doubtfire and Nine Months was exactly what he wanted to have on-screen. Does this make him a good director even though his taste is mainstream suburban crap.

  21. Josh Massey says:

    The two “Pirates” movies were fun despite Verbinski, not because of him.

  22. jeffmcm says:

    Josh, can you explain that in a little more detail?

  23. frankbooth says:

    The best directors display a signature that’s unmistakeable, and over time they amass indelible (if not always consistent) bodies of work. Sometime their names even become adjectives. ( I somehow doubt anyone will ever use the word “Howardian.”) And their influence on subsequent generations is undeniable.
    Then there are the competent workmen who are hit-or-miss: the Peter Hyamses and John Badhams. Ratner may be one of these. It’s hard to say, since I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Ratner movie.
    There are Michael Ritchies who start out strong and wind up in the toilet. See Lee Tamahori for the extremely accelerated version of this syndrome.
    Most mystifying are the Frankenheimers of the world, who are like the proverbial little girl with the forehead curl. When he was good, we got Manchirian Candidate and Seconds. When he was bad, we got giant naked bears and Brando in a mumu lecturing Mini-Me.

  24. RDP says:

    Zsigmond did “Jersey Girl”. Dave Klein was the DP on “Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back”, but the point is the same (actually JASBSB probably had more potential to be visually interesting given the scope of the story than Jersey Girl).
    Personally, I may be biased, but I don’t think writers and editors are given enough credit in Hollywood for the resultant movies. It all starts on the page, and while directors like Hitchcock and others were “in the room” kinda guys who really contributed significantly to creating and fleshing out the stories they eventually directed, that’s usually not the case these days.
    As for “A Film By”, it isn’t going away. The DGA is apparently prepared to strike over their ability to negotiate for the credit and the studios are apparently willing to give it away to just about anybody who asks for it (I know a first time director who’s shooting in the Fall who didn’t even ask for a “Film By” credit but got it in his contract anyway).

  25. lazarus says:

    I don’t think writers are deserving of any more credit then they have. With all due respect to people like Charlie Kaufman, Budd Schulberg or Ernest Loehman, what a sad line of work for a writer to go into, when you know you will not have control over the final product. A playwright is usually given the most credit for the quality of a play; a novelist obviously has the most control of the end product. Screenwriting, however is a pathetic, nearly thankless path for a writer to follow, and it’s ridiculous for them to cry foul over possessory credit. You want more control? Try a different fucking medium.
    It’s not like you can rattle off a list of brilliant screenwriters that never got their due, because the truly great ones are usually directors as well, from Lubitsch to Wilder to Lee to Bergman to Allen to Truffaut to Almodovar to the Coens. It’s a lot easier to think of the scores of hacks like Akiva Goldsman that contribute to the crap that clutters up the multiplexes. Even someone credible like John Michael Hayes was at the service of a much more creative force in Hitchcock, or like Paddy Chayefsky a novelist as well. Someone like Charlie Kaufman stands out so much because there isn’t anyone else even worth talking about, let alone considering whether they’re a gifted authorial force. Do you ever read articles or hear people talking about esteemed foreign language screenwriters? No, because no one in other countries cares either.
    I’ve written a few scripts myself–I understand the hard work that goes into them, and the talent required to fashion a really great one. But to claim that the writer of a film is even close to being as important as the person who places the camera, directs the actors, chooses the takes, cuts the scenes together–that’s fucking ridiculous.

  26. mutinyco says:

    Yes…that would explain: “Paddy Chayefsky’s Network”…

  27. palmtree says:

    I think the quality of a director is determined by how well he gets his collaborators to do their jobs. He takes a little bit of credit for what everyone else does…adding up into more. My current favorite director is Tsai Ming Liang, who is an auteur in every shape and form. Hell, he even hired Jean Pierre Leaud to make a cameo in one of his best movies.
    I find the term auteur really overused. The work has to merit the title.

  28. Crow T Robot says:

    I’m with Josh here: If your film happens to be “the fastest grossing movie of all time” but people still can’t think of anything to say about your signature style or aesthetic choices, then you are just as much of a failure as any other hack whose movie bombed because of its mediocrity.
    Movies are a funny this way… I mean I know dozens of businessmen who’d love to be the next Warren Buffett, Bill Gates or Donald Trump. But I can’t think of one young filmmaker who aspires to Andrew Adamson, Chris Columbus or Gore “The Man Who Heard Test Screenings” Verbinski.

  29. jeffmcm says:

    “Paddy Chayefsky’s Network” is the exception that proves the rule, both for Hollywood in general, and within Chayefsky’s own career (although The Hospital is close).

  30. KamikazeCamelV2.0 says:

    “The quality of a director is determined by his ability to get on screen the movie he wanted to make.”
    I’d agree with that, but apparently Shyamalan made the exact movie he wanted to with Lady in the Water but I doubt he’s gonna get any best director nominations.
    “But to claim that the writer of a film is even close to being as important as the person who places the camera, directs the actors, chooses the takes, cuts the scenes together–that’s fucking ridiculous.”
    Wait, the writer is less important than the editor? Considering an editor works from the from script, that seems a bit contradictory. The writer may not be as important as the director, but without the screenwriter nobody has a job.

  31. jeffmcm says:

    Ah, but the editor often does not work from the script. In fact, many editors don’t look at the script while they’re editing, depending on how closely or not the director followed it.

  32. Dave says:

    When you look at Eastwood’s films there are clearly recurring, unifying themes which crop up time and again in his work; his interest in surrogate families brought together because they have no one else on whom to rely and which shows itself in The Outlaw Josey Wales, Bronco Billy and Million Dollar Baby. Or the fascination with working class characters and environments in many of his films including Honkytonk Man, Bird, Mystic River and Million Dollar Baby. Then there’s what I think one could reasonably describe as a gentle humanism in Eastwood’s work which locates itself at the centre of a harsh and unforgiving universe. Million Dollar Baby and Unforgiven being perhaps the greatest although by no means the only examples of that. Perhaps most remarkably there’s been Eastwood’s own tough guy screen persona and the many variations he’s been able to spin on that (especially his willingness to show himself in a less than flattering light) all under the guiding hand of Eastwood, the director.
    That aside I find Eastwood’s style as a director distinctive in his choice of subtle, unobtrusive camera setups, his use of lighting and mise-en-scene and just the rhythm of his films. Oh, and in answer to the poster who asked whether you’d recognise a Clint film if he wasn’t in it all I can say is that the likes of Bird, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and Mystic River fit perfectly – thematically and directorially – within Eastwood’s oeuvre. If you’re familiar with his style then I would strongly argue they are instantly recognisable as Eastwood movies even if the star himself isn’t in them.

  33. RDP says:

    Now that I think about, I’m starting to wonder why Hollywood even hires writers anymore. They’re obviously of so little importance.
    I know when I go see a movie, the last thing I want is to see is a story. If I want a story, I’ll read a damn book.
    I personally couldn’t give two craps about the “Film By” credit. It’s a stupid issue to get all twisted up about and I think the WGA does themselves a disservice if/when they make it a big negotiation point (unless it’s one of those things that you don’t really care about, so you give up the fight against it in order to gain something else).
    However, I do think movies would probably be at least a little worse without scripts. Maybe that’s just me, though.

  34. Aladdin Sane says:

    I couldn’t think of anything to add earlier, and I don’t have much right now, but I can’t recall anyone mentioning Danny Boyle, who I think is one of the best directors working right now. I don’t know about his upcoming flick, Sunshine, but that little quasi-preview online looks engaging. Definitely not a premise that is believable, but when did that count in movies? Anyhow, all of his films are different. How many directors follow up a film like 28 Days Later with Millions? I haven’t seen all of his films, but the ones I have seen are all interesting in different ways – Trainspotting is as different from A Life Less Ordinary as Millions is different from The Beach.
    What frustrates me is directors who I know could be good. Joel Schumacher made one of the great films of the 90s with Falling Down, yet he really hasn’t done anything since that is up to that standard. Does it make him a bad director? He seems to be a very stylistic director when given a big budget (Batman Forever or The Phantom of the Opera), but give him a smaller budget, and you get something like Tigerland, which for me, is his best film since Falling Down. He seems to be his own worst enemy. I don’t think he’s gonna win an Oscar anytime soon, but I’d sooner he direct a movie than Brett Ratner – at least if it’s a failure, it’ll be an interesting failure.
    I agree that with a Spielberg film, you’re gonna know it’s a film by him cos of the feeling that is going into it…the ones where he seems on cruise control are the ones no one cares about though – I don’t know of many who think The Lost World is a memorable film for example. His collaboration with Michael Kahn has got to be one of the most envied in the business. He found an editor early on that
    “got” what he was about, and I’d say that even in his mis-steps, Kahn helps make it seem stronger than it is (just wish he’d talked Steven out of the last half hour of AI). Janusz Kaminski is also another one that definitely helps out in getting Spielberg’s vision to the scene. I’d love to be a fly on the wall and hear how they go about setting up what a shot’ll be etc – I still think of the highway roaming camera shot in War of the Worlds and can’t help but be amazed – lesser directors and cinematographers wouldn’t have tried something like that, but they pulled it off spledidly.
    I think if any modern director does deserve the term Auteur, it is Spielberg. True he may not write his own stuff, but I doubt you’ll ever walk into a movie of his and say, “this isn’t Spielberg stuff” (plus the obligatory John Williams score – also helping weak films seem more majestic the world over).

  35. Aladdin Sane says:

    er splendidly, not spledidly. i blame the early hour.

  36. crazycris says:

    I’ve often heard it said that while theatre is the actor’s medium, film is the director’s. This being the case you could expect to recognise the director’s influence in so many more movies than we currently do. I agree with the concept and importance of “auteurs”. I think when we see movies by these directors (i.e. Almodovar, Eastwood, Spielberd, Alejandro Amenabar, Alfonso Cuaron, Scorsese, Coppola… to name just a few current ones) we’re invited into THEIR world, or their view of it. I see a film titled “by” one of these directors, and I have an idea of what I’ll be seeing, and can almost guarantee my attendance. But it’s not just the auteurs. Any director who has been involved with a given project from the beginning to the end (discussing script, casting, editing etc) is going to have a major influence on the final look and feel of the film (J.J.Abrams and M:I3 anyone?), because as someone mentioned above he has the role of the “conductor” and has to find a way to harmoniously bring all the different elements together. It’s from these situations that we usually get our better movies (although am not including M:I3 in that qualification).
    The reason we don’t see more of this is probably a part of the big blockbuster phenomenon, where there is less of an attempt at equal roles between the different elements (see special effects over story or characters), and frequently directors changed several times, brought in at the last minute etc… I hate when I go see a movie and come out feeling “damn! that COULD have been so much better!” (X3 for example). Frustrating!

  37. crazycris says:

    Oh, and to answer the original question that started this thread: I don’t think you can indiscriminately compare all directors. In some cases it would be like comparing apples and figs, too different! It’s like comparing a summer blockbuster to a more “serious” film: one is just for “fun”; the other (usually) more thought-provoking, aimed at getting people to think about a certain subject, or awaken their concious. You don’t go about these two different projects in the same way!

  38. Spacesheik says:

    Even though “Auteur” directors are highly talented, skilled and brilliant:Hitchcock, Burton, Truffaut, for example, they always seem to have an “imprint,” a certain style, they are relegated to certain genres, and that, imho, diminishes their impact.
    To me a great director is someone like John Huston, who can traverse through different genres and eras, with no particular “style” and still produce celluloid treats such as MALTESE FALCON, AFRICAN QUEEN, TREASURE OF SIERRA MADRE, ASPHALT JUNGLE, MOBY DICK, MOULIN ROUGE, NIGHT OF THE IGUANA, FAT CITY, LIFE AND TIME OF JUDGE ROY BEAN, THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING and PRIZZI’S HONOR.
    Look at that list. Look at the genres. And that’s just general sampling of his work (not including other classics such as THE MISFITS etc).
    Huston to me is an awesome director.

  39. Melquiades says:

    I don’t think I’ve seen anybody here mention Spike Lee. He’s certainly an auteur in that you can generally tell a “Spike Lee Joint” from watching just a couple scenes (even Inside Man, which was something of a departure).
    Of the new crop, I’d say Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu have all developed a consistent style and theme that qualifies them as true auteurs.
    Almodovar is another master whose name doesn’t come up enough in discussions of the best film auteurs.

  40. James Leer says:

    The trouble is that most American film directors who work inside the system simply have too diversified a filmography to comfortably fit the auteur theory. And I think it’s dangerously reductive to say that one must qualify under this header in order to be considered a great director, as you’ll be eliminating a lot of excellent people and films…Steven Soderbergh, Curtis Hanson, David O. Russell — and that’s just for starters…

  41. jeffmcm says:

    I would say that Soderbergh and Russell (even though he hasn’t made a lot of movies) qualify as auteurs – they have pretty consistent bodies of work, Soderbergh especially if you’ve read Getting Away With It.

  42. lazarus says:

    Let’s also not make the mistake of saying that evey director who writes his own material is an auteur. While Huckabees was definitely the work of a unique vision, I don’t know that Russell’s work up to this point represents that of an auteur. Soderbergh, by comparison, who’s only written a couple scripts (Sex Lies and Solaris, if I’m not mistaken), has a clear style that has evolved over the years and can be traced through each successive film. Even when making Hollywood fare like the Ocean’s films, he maintains creative control, and in the case of Ocean’s 12, has played with style and form in a way that is pretty rare for the American blockbuster.

  43. Dr Wally says:

    I think timelessness is a quality that marks out a great director, which is why Speilberg is my favorite. Leave aside cosmetic stuff like fashions, hairstyles etc and his movies simply do not date. Munich looks like it was made in the ’70’s. Saving Private Ryan and Schindler’s List look as if they were made in the 1940’s. On the other hand, Jaws and Raiders of the Lost Ark STILL look as fresh as a daisy and could have been made yesterday.

  44. jeffmcm says:

    Saving Private Ryan has some pretty intense violence for a movie made in the 1940s.

  45. Hopscotch says:

    If you nix the violence some of the stuff from SPR, it looks exactly like a 40’s, 50’s movie.
    I saw Saving Private Ryan in a theater maybe five times. Parts of it age well, and parts don’t. Aside from the bookends there are some other parts that just feel wrong and phony…while other scenes (Wade’s death, in particular) I think are some of Spielberg’s best. It’s Hanks best performance too. Second best movie of 1998 (next to The Big Lebowski of course).
    For my money this theory of Director’s as artists doesn’t fly. Directors are more like committee chairs: They talk to and negotiate with different sub-committees (Actors, costume designer, dps, writers) while trying to sweet-talk investors and keep their project under budget. That’s what directors do. Art house directors do the same thing just on a smaller scale.

  46. jeffmcm says:

    So by your logic, a movie is a big committee project, like a parade or a county fair? I pretty much disagree. The director probably hired all of the department head. He/she isn’t ‘negotiating’ with them, he/she is directing them on what to do. Somebody has to be the boss, and it’s 99% of the time either the director or the producer.
    [The bookmarks are an essential part of SPR’s underlying meaning.]

  47. palmtree says:

    Directors are not telling people what to do so much as making sure they are on the same page artistically.
    Producers are the ones who talk to investors and worry about budget.

  48. Hopscotch says:

    The beginning and end stages of making movies (writing, then editing and scoring) can be described as artistic endeavors. The shoot is different. When you’ve got literally dozens of people on a set, a budget sheet, a call sheet, trailers, lights, cables, cords, tents, and it all needs to be done by sundown…it is kind of like a county fair.
    Negotiating budgets and time is a big part of a director’s job and that’s what I was referring to.

  49. palmtree says:

    Those jobs are mostly handled by line producers or unit production managers not to mention the assistant director. The director hopefully is not concerning himself with tents and cables but with the actors’ performance and where the cinematographer will put the camera.

  50. Hopscotch says:

    Yes, but all those guys answer to the Director (and Producer).

  51. jeffmcm says:

    It’s a good director’s job to maintain artistry throughout the process, in writing, shooting, and post-production. A well-prepared director will know what his shots are and will hav rehearsed with the actors before shooting commences, so that the production can run smoothly. But as the story a week or so about the guy who had worked on the sets of both Pearl Harbor and Gangs of New York mentioned, just because a set is running smoothly doesn’t mean something good is being made.

  52. palmtree says:

    “Yes, but all those guys answer to the Director (and Producer).”
    In terms of artistic vision, yes. In terms of budget, schedule, logistics…not so much. Maybe it’s not a clear cut division between the two, but it’s not like the director is orchestrating the whole thing by himself either.

  53. jeffmcm says:

    Who do they answer to if not the director or producer?

  54. palmtree says:

    Okay, sorry for the confusion. They do answer to the producer. What made the statement weird was putting producer in parentheses, as if he was secondary and lower on the totem pole. I would go so far as to say the director answers to the producer, but that depends on the shoot.

  55. jeffmcm says:

    That is correct, but often times the producer has no idea what the director is doing so as long as there are enough pretty girls and explosions, a director can get away with his stuff.

  56. palmtree says:

    ^^^As long as it’s on schedule and on budget and not a bastardization of the original story, why not?

  57. Aladdin Sane says:

    Well I’m sure the original screenwriter will have a few words to say about whether or not something is a bastardization of the original story…;)

  58. Melquiades says:

    The Saving Private Ryan bookends make absolutely no sense in the context of the film, and they’re embarassingly maudlin compared to the rest of the film. They take an otherwise great film and render it mediocre.

  59. Josh Massey says:

    I do love that girl with the big breasts in the background, though.

  60. ployp says:

    I like the idea of the director as the conductor of a movie set. And I love this thread. Very informative.

  61. Cadavra says:

    Which is why I love Walter Hill, who once said, “I have no greater aspiration than to be another Don Siegel.”

  62. jeffmcm says:

    Sigh…
    The Saving Private Ryan bookends are an essential element to Spielberg’s thesis in the film, which has to do not just with ‘war is hell’ but also that acts of war have moral implications that reverberate for years. Hanks tells Damon (and by proxy, the audience) ‘earn this’ and the bookends bring this message into the present day, preventing the movie from being seen as a period action-romp. By using the bookends, Spielberg contextualizes the drama the body of the film and challenges the audience to connect the visceral action to their everyday lives.
    The bookends are what raise the film from good to great.

  63. jeffmcm says:

    I apologize for how Armond White-ish that was.

  64. Joe Leydon says:

    Jeff: Worse, that reads like some of the academic journals I have to peruse periodically. Or some of the textbooks I consider — but reject — for my film history courses. I wish to God someone would update Arthur Knight’s “The Liveliest Art” — now THERE was an accessible textbook. (If there are any literary agents out there: I’d be willing to audition for the rewrite gig.)
    Cadavra: As I told my class just last night — John Ford once told an interviewer: “It’s no use talking to me about art, I make pictures to pay the rent.”

  65. jeffmcm says:

    Sorry for my lack of stylistics, but I consider my reading correct.
    And don’t you think Ford was being modest, as most of his generation tended towards?

  66. Joe Leydon says:

    Jeff: Lighten up, dude. Of COURSE you are correct. It’s just that, whenever I read “contextualize,” I reach for my gun.
    As for Ford’s modesty: I think he was being sincere. But it’s just as possible that he was actively attempting to keep his ego in line, because he saw what happened to other filmmakers who got too full of themselves. As Buster Keaton once told an interviewer:

  67. jeffmcm says:

    A director actively trying to keep his ego in line?!?! Don’t tell M. Night.
    I thought Chaplin’s problems had more to do with politics and women than ego.

  68. Joe Leydon says:

    Have you ever seen Chaplin’s “A King in New York”? Arguably the worst movie ever made by a great filmmaker. (Of course, John Huston’s “Phobia” runs a close second. And as someone else mentioned: John Frankenheimer’s “Prophecy” also has a place on that list.)

  69. jeffmcm says:

    I have seen AKiNY and actually thought it was good, obviously not as good as Modern Times or The Gold Rush, but certainly not bad, and better than the overrated Monsieur Verdoux.
    I was introduced to Frankenheimer’s Prophecy thanks to Stephen King’s high regard for it as quality trash. It’s bad, but it’s never boring, and that makes up for a lot.

  70. Joe Leydon says:

    Eh, I think we’ll have to agree to disagree on those two.

  71. jeffmcm says:

    How can you not find the charm in a movie about James Brolin being chased by a guy in a costume that looks like a bear turned inside-out? That’s cinema, my friend.

  72. Joe Leydon says:

    You know, when I found out years later that John Frankenheimer had developed a very serious drinking problem — like, serious enough to nearly kill him — after the assassination of Bobby Kennedy, and didn’t clean up his act until the 1980s, the first thing I thought was: Gee. That explains a lot about “Prophecy.”

  73. jeffmcm says:

    It doesn’t explain The Island of Dr. Moreau, though.

  74. Joe Leydon says:

    Well, really: What could?

  75. frankbooth says:

    Now, let’s not blame poor James Brolin for something he had nothing to do wth. He’s taken part in enough atrocities as it stands.

  76. Cadavra says:

    And don’t forget that Frankenheimer took over MOREAU when the original director was sacked midway through shooting. Throw in a couple of lunatics like Brando and Kilmer, and it’s a miracle he didn’t start drinking again!

  77. jeffmcm says:

    I’m sorry, I could have sworn that it was Brolin but it was in fact an actor named Robert Foxworth who still has a thriving career today.

  78. Spacesheik says:

    Hehehe that’s right FALCONCREST’s Robert Foxworth it was (I think he teaches film now in some Eastern college).
    PROPHECY…Ack..and it also had Talia Shire, fresh from ROCKY.
    Yeah looked like some dude in a fur sut with a bad case of acne.

  79. Spacesheik says:

    As for ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU…Brando in pancake makeup with a midget playing piano – that’s when I walked out the theatre.
    Made Frankenheimer’s PROPHECY look like BATTLESHIP POTEMPKIN.

  80. Lota says:

    aww Spaceshiek, yer mean.
    Yes aside from directorial change, Val Kilmer wasn’t even “working” he should have been fired. I think Brando could have done it had the movie been a straight remake of Island of Lost SOuls which was the best adaptation of the Moreau book that one could hope for. David Thewlis was the absolute worst choice for a leading man, cuz he aint one. He’s a limp noodle.
    I knew we were in trouble when I realized there was no handsome/macho leading man and no Lota (what about Meeeee!) : ( The girl Aissa talked WAY too much to be a version of Lota. There was too much dialog altogether.
    ALso the inappropriate CGI was completely uneccessary. The original movie is still brilliant and biologically correct.
    Having said that, I still bought the 1996 movie! I did find the scene with the little dwarf solemnly shaking Thewlis’ hand touching.
    It should be remade again with half the dialog and no histrionics.
    To be honest I think 96-Moreau is a piece of framable art compared to Prophecy. Bloody awful, that.

  81. frankbooth says:

    Can’t blame you too much, Jeff. Could be anyone under all that that hair and beard. I’m somewhat embarrassed that I even caught that one.
    And now I’ll dig myself even deeper by saying something nice about the movie: I (vaguely) recall that it contained at least one decent scene. A bunch of characters are hiding from the mutant-thingy in a mine or cave. There’s a long silence as they wonder if they’ve gotten away–and then the critter begins to assault their refuge, roaring and smashing the walls. It’s all done with sound effects and acting, and is a fairly suspenseful sequence. Unfortunately, JF was only too happy to include several shots of actors running on treadmills in front of a silly-looking, rear-projected monster elsewhere in the movie.
    Maybe that’s the definition of a good director. Even in a crappy film, there will be a couple of scenes that betray his or her talent. A competent hack may have a more smoothly consistent body of work. To bring up a certain former TV actor again, it’s hard to imagine him making such egregious lapses of taste, just as its hard to picture him ever transcending his material.

  82. jeffmcm says:

    Spaceshiek: “As for ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU…Brando in pancake makeup with a midget playing piano – that’s when I walked out the theatre.”
    Are you kidding? That’s when it got good!
    Lota: “The original movie is still brilliant and biologically correct.”
    I agree on the first part of your sentence, but I have my doubts about the second.

  83. Lota says:

    IOLS made ‘correct’ predictions of/allusions to what would come to pass in many aspects of cloning, chimeras, stem cells, years before its time.

  84. jeffmcm says:

    Great…but they still can’t make a panther woman. Especially not while Rick Santorum is in the Senate.

  85. Lota says:

    “but they still can’t make a panther woman”
    Dude, what do you think I am? I’m just not quite finished yet. That stubborn beast-flesh keeps creeping back.
    Hope the stem cell things gets passed soon, two of my family members are going to die very young if they don;t.

  86. jeffmcm says:

    “That stubborn beast-flesh keeps creeping back.”
    My mom gets that too.

  87. Joe Leydon says:

    Lota: Cue Hall & Oates — “Heeeeeeeeeere she comes! Watch out boy, she’ll chew you up. Heeeeeeeeeeere she comes! She’s a maneater!”

  88. Lota says:

    no thanks Joe. Humans eat alot of crap so i don;t feast on them, even though I sure would like to cull the population at times. Prefer caribou or moose.
    Craftsmen tend to get forgotten-everyone seems to remember ‘auteurs’ and as well as complete idiots.
    Few people know Erle C Kenton, who directed over 100 movies in ~50 years. I don;t think he’d fit the classic def of an Auteur but he was a craftsman. he made alot of very entertaining movies. He started out in comedy, then moved to horror, Island of Lost Souls being his best horror pic. Some others that are entertaining include The House of Dracula and the weird, The Cat Creeps.
    He also did Abbot and Costello’s best feature (I think) Pardon my sarong.

  89. palmtree says:

    That’s really hot. I haven’t been this turned on since Princess Mononoke.

  90. Joe Leydon says:

    Sorry: “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein” is the greatest A&C movie of all time. Ohhhhh, Chick! Chiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiick!!!!!!

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon