343 Directors of Ale

1. Terence Davies

Terence Davies was born on November 10, 1945 in Liverpool, England, UK. He was a writer and director, known for Distant Voices, Still Lives (1988), The House of Mirth (2000) and Benediction (2021). He died on October 7, 2023 in Mistley, Essex, England, UK.

Distant Voices, Still Lives A Quiet Passion The Long Day Closes Benediction Sunset Song Of Time and the City

2. Lav Diaz

Writer | Ang babaeng humayo

Lav Diaz was born on December 30, 1958 in Datu Paglas, Maguindanao, Mindanao, Philippines. He is a writer and director, known for The Woman Who Left (2016), Season of the Devil (2018) and From What Is Before (2014).

Ebolusyon ng isang pamilyang Pilipino / Evolution of a Filipino Family Batang West Side / West Side Avenue Melancholia Mula sa kung ano ang noon / From What Is Before Norte, hangganan ng kasaysayan / Norte, the End of History Historiya ni Ha / History of Ha Ang hupa / The Halt

3. Carl Theodor Dreyer

Writer | Gertrud

The illegitimate son of a Danish farmer and his Swedish housekeeper, Carl Theodor Dreyer was born in Copenhagen on the 3th of February, 1889. He spent his early years in various foster homes before being adopted by the Dreyers at the age of two. Contrary to popular belief (perhaps nourished by the ...

Ordet La passion de Jeanne d'Arc Gertrud Du skal ære din hustru / Master of the House Vampyr Prästänkan / The Parson's Widow Præsidenten

4. Jean-Luc Godard

Director | Bande à part

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

Weekend Le mépris / Contempt Alphaville Pierrot le fou Histoire(s) du cinéma À bout de souffle / Breathless Hélas pour moi / Oh, Woe is Me Vivre sa vie: Film en douze tableaux/My Life to Live

5. Fritz Lang

Actor | Le mépris

Fritz Lang was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1890. His father managed a construction company. His mother, Pauline Schlesinger, was Jewish but converted to Catholicism when Lang was ten. After high school, he enrolled briefly at the Technische Hochschule Wien and then started to train as a painter. ...

M Metropolis Western Union Die Niebelungen The Big Heat Moonfleet Fury Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler

6. Guy Maddin

Director | The Heart of the World

Guy Maddin was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, to Herdis Maddin (a hair-dresser) and Charles "Chas" Maddin (grain clerk and general manager of the Maroons, a Winnipeg hockey team). Maddin studied economics at the University of Winnipeg, working as a bank manager, house painter, and photographic...

The Forbidden Room My Winnipeg The Heart of the World The Saddest Music in the World Archangel Odilon Redon

7. Yasujirô Ozu

Writer | Tôkyô monogatari

Tokyo-born Yasujiro Ozu was a movie buff from childhood, often playing hooky from school in order to see Hollywood movies in his local theatre. In 1923 he landed a job as a camera assistant at Shochiku Studios in Tokyo. Three years later, he was made an assistant director and directed his first ...

Banshun / Late Spring Tôkyô monogatari / Tokyo Story Kaze no naka no mendori / A Hen in the Wind Otona no miru ehon - Umarete wa mita keredo / I Was Born, But... Bakushû / Early Summer Hitori musoko / The Only Son Sôshun / Early Spring

8. Michael Powell

Director | Peeping Tom

The son of Thomas William Powell and Mabel (nee Corbett). Michael Powell was always a self-confessed movie addict. He was brought up partly in Canterbury ("The Garden of England") and partly in the south of France (where his parents ran a hotel). Educated at Kings School, Canterbury and Dulwich ...

*A Canterbury Tale *'I Know Where I'm Going!' The Thief of Bagdad Peeping Tom *The Tales of Hoffman *The Red Shoes *The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp *Black Narcissus

*with Emeric Pressburger

9. Jacques Rivette

Director | La Belle Noiseuse

Although François Truffaut has written that the New Wave began "thanks to Rivette," the films of this masterful French director are not well known. Rivette, like his "Cahiers du Cinéma" colleagues Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol and Éric Rohmer, did graduate to filmmaking but, like Rohmer...

Out 1, noli me tangere L'amour fou Céline et Julie vont en bateau/Celine and Julie Go Boating Noroît / Nor'wester Duelle (une quarantaine) / Twhylight Paris nous appartient / Paris Belong to Us La religieuse / The Nun L'amour par terre / Love on the Ground Haut bas fragile / Up Down Fragile Le pont du nord / The North Bridge La belle noiseuse

10. Raúl Ruiz

Director | La Telenovela Errante

Chilean director Raúl, or Raoul, Ruiz (1941-2011) was one of the most exciting and innovative filmmakers to emerge from 1960s World Cinema, providing more intellectual fun and artistic experimentation, shot for shot, than any filmmaker since Jean-Luc Godard. A guerrilla who uncompromisingly ...

Le temps retrouvé, d'après l'oeuvre de Marcel Proust / Time Regained Mistérios de Lisboa Manoel dans l'île des merveilles / Manoel on the Island of Wonders Mammame Colloque de chiens / Dog's Dialogue L'hypothèse du tableau volé / Hypothesis of the Stolen Painting Zig-Zag - le jeu de l'oie (Une fiction didactique à propos de la cartographie) / Snakes and Ladders

11. Andrei Tarkovsky

Writer | Offret

The most famous Soviet film-maker since Sergei Eisenstein, Andrei Tarkovsky (the son of noted poet Arseniy Tarkovsky) studied music and Arabic in Moscow before enrolling in the Soviet film school VGIK. He shot to international attention with his first feature, Ivan's Childhood (1962), which won the...

Stalker Offret / The Sacrifice Andrei Rublev Zerkalo / Mirror Solaris Nostalghia Ivanovo detstvo / Ivan's Childhood

12. Agnès Varda

Director | Cléo de 5 à 7

Agnès Varda was born on May 30, 1928 in Ixelles, Belgium. She was a director and writer, known for Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962), Vagabond (1985) and Faces Places (2017). She was married to Jacques Demy. She died on March 29, 2019 in Paris, France.

Le bonheur / Happiness Mur murs Les glaneurs et la glaneuse / The Gleaners and I Visages villages / Faces Places Cléo de 5 à 7 / Cleo From 5 to 7

13. Orson Welles

Actor | Citizen Kane

His father, Richard Head Welles, was a well-to-do inventor, his mother, Beatrice (Ives) Welles, a beautiful concert pianist; Orson Welles was gifted in many arts (magic, piano, painting) as a child. When his mother died in 1924 (when he was nine) he traveled the world with his father. He was ...

The Magnificent Ambersons Chimes at Midnight / Falstaff Citizen Kane Touch of Evil Le procès / The Trial The Tragedy of Othello: The Moor of Venice / Othello The Lady from Shanghai The Other Side of the Wind

14. Bahram Beyzaie

Writer | Sagkoshi

Bahram Beizai started skipping school from around the age of 17 in order to go to movies which were becoming popular in Iran at a rapid pace. This only fed his hunger to learn more about cinema and the visual arts. By 1961 he had already spent a lot of time studying-and researching- ancient persian...

Bashu, gharibeye koochak / Bashu, the Little Stranger Mosaferan / Travellers Ragbar / Downpour Shayad Vaghti Deegar / Maybe Some Other Time

15. Robert Bresson

Writer | Au hasard Balthazar

Robert Bresson trained as a painter before moving into films as a screenwriter, making a short film (atypically a comedy), Public Affairs (1934) in 1934. After spending more than a year as a German POW during World War II, he made his debut with Angels of Sin (1943) in 1943. His next film, The ...

Un condamné à mort s'est échappé ou Le vent souffle où il veut / A Man Escaped Au hasard Balthazar Lancelot du lac Pickpocket Journal d'un curé de campagne / Diary of a Country Priest L'argent Mouchette

*I consider Bresson particularly hard to rate and this is thus a particularly inaccurate list*

16. Frank Capra

Director | It's a Wonderful Life

One of seven children, Frank Capra was born on May 18, 1897, in Bisacquino, Sicily. On May 10, 1903, his family left for America aboard the ship Germania, arriving in New York on May 23rd. "There's no ventilation, and it stinks like hell. They're all miserable. It's the most degrading place you ...

It's a Wonderful Life Lost Horizon Meet John Doe It Happened One Night Mr. Smith Goes to Washington The Bitter Tea of General Yen

17. John Cassavetes

Actor | Rosemary's Baby

John Cassavetes was a Greek-American actor, film director, and screenwriter. He is considered a pioneer of American independent film, as he often financed his own films.

Cassavetes was born in New York City in 1929 to Nicholas John Cassavetes (1893-1979) and his wife, Katherine Demetre (1906-1983). ...

Opening Night Faces A Woman Under the Influence Husbands Minnie and Moskowitz Gloria Love Streams

18. Louis Feuillade

Director | Les vampires

A prolific director--over 700 films, most of them short- or medium-length--Louis Feuillade began his career with Gaumont where, as well as directing his own features, he was appointed artistic director in charge of production in 1907. His work was largely comprised of film series; his first series,...

Tih minh Les vampires Fantômas Judex

19. John Ford

Director | The Quiet Man

John Ford came to Hollywood following one of his brothers, an actor. Asked what brought him to Hollywood, he replied "the train". He became one of the most respected directors in the business, in spite of being known for his westerns, which were not considered "serious" film. He won six Oscars, ...

The Searchers The Sun Shines Bright Stagecoach The Grapes of Wrath My Darling Clementine

20. Alfred Hitchcock

Director | Psycho

Alfred Joseph Hitchcock was born in Leytonstone, Essex, England. He was the son of Emma Jane (Whelan; 1863 - 1942) and East End greengrocer William Hitchcock (1862 - 1914). His parents were both of half English and half Irish ancestry. He had two older siblings, William Hitchcock (born 1890) and ...

Vertigo Rear Window Shadow of a Doubt The Birds

21. Chuck Jones

Actor | Gremlins

Starting as a cel washer, Chuck Jones worked his way up to animator and then director at the animation division of Warner Bros. He is famous for creating such beloved cartoon characters as Wile E. Coyote, Henery Hawk, Pepé Le Pew, Marvin the Martian, Ralph Wolf, Road Runner, Sam Sheepdog, Sniffles,...

Rabbit of Seville What's Opera, Doc? How the Grinch Stole Christmas! One Froggy Evening Feed the Kitty Rabbit Seasoning Duck! Rabbit, Duck!

22. Abbas Kiarostami

Writer | Copie conforme

Abbas Kiarostami was born in Tehran, Iran, in 1940. He graduated from university with a degree in fine arts before starting work as a graphic designer. He then joined the Center for Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults, where he started a film section, and this started his career ...

Nema-ye Nazdik / Close-Up Bad ma ra khahad bord / The Wind Will Carry Us Copie conforme / Certified Copy Zendegi va digar hich / Life and Nothing More... Ta'm e guilass / Taste of Cherry 24 Frames

23. Stanley Kubrick

Director | 2001: A Space Odyssey

Stanley Kubrick was born in Manhattan, New York City, to Sadie Gertrude (Perveler) and Jacob Leonard Kubrick, a physician. His family were Jewish immigrants (from Austria, Romania, and Russia). Stanley was considered intelligent, despite poor grades at school. Hoping that a change of scenery would ...

2001: A Space Odyssey Paths of Glory Dr. Strangelove Eyes Wide Shut Barry Lyndon

24. Sergio Leone

Writer | Once Upon a Time in America

Sergio Leone was virtually born into the cinema - he was the son of Roberto Roberti (A.K.A. Vincenzo Leone), one of Italy's cinema pioneers, and actress Bice Valerian. Leone entered films in his late teens, working as an assistant director to both Italian directors and U.S. directors working in ...

Once Upon a Time in America C'era una volta il West / Once Upon a Time in the West Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo / The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

25. David Lynch

Writer | Twin Peaks

Born in precisely the kind of small-town American setting so familiar from his films, David Lynch spent his childhood being shunted from one state to another as his research scientist father kept getting relocated. He attended various art schools, married Peggy Lynch and then fathered future ...

Eraserhead Inland Empire Mulholland Dr. Blue Velvet

26. Kenji Mizoguchi

Director | Ugetsu monogatari

Coming from a lower class family Mizoguchi entered the production company Nikkatsu as an actor specialized in female roles. Later he became an assistant director and made his first film in 1922. Although he filmed almost 90 movies in the silent era, only his last 12 productions are really known ...

Sanshô Dayû / Sansho the Bailiff Zangiku monogatari / The Story of the Last Chrysanthemum Saikaku ichidai onna / The Life of Oharu Ugetsu monogatari Genroku Chûshingura / The 47 Ronin Yôkihi / Princess Yang Kwei Fei

27. Mikio Naruse

Director | Ukigumo

Considered a major figure of Japan's 'golden age of cinema', Mikio Naruse was a filmmaker, screenwriter, and producer who directed 89 films in the period 1930 to 1967. Although Naruse's work is lesser known in the twenty-first century than those of his contemporaries Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi...

Yama no oto / The Sound of the Mountain Tsuma yo bara no yô ni / Wife! Be Like a Rose! Uta andon / The Song Lantern Okaasan / Mother Okuni to Gohei

28. Jean Renoir

Writer | La règle du jeu

Son of the famous Impressionist painter Pierre Auguste, he had a happy childhood. Pierre Renoir was his brother, and Claude Renoir was his nephew. After the end of World War I, where he won the Croix de Guerre, he moved from scriptwriting to filmmaking. He married Catherine Hessling, for whom he ...

La règle du jeu / The Rules of the Game La grande illusion Partie de campagne / A Day in the Country

29. Alain Resnais

Director | Hiroshima mon amour

Alain Resnais was born on June 3, 1922 in Vannes, Morbihan, France. He was a director and editor, known for Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959), Same Old Song (1997) and My American Uncle (1980). He was married to Sabine Azéma and Florence Malraux. He died on March 1, 2014 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, ...

Muriel ou le temps d'un retour / Muriel L'année dernière à Marienbad / Last Year at Marienbad Mon oncle d'Amérique Toute la mémoire du monde Nuit et brouillard / Night and Fog Le chant du Styrène La guerre est finie / The War is Over Guernica

30. Martin Scorsese

Producer | Killers of the Flower Moon

Martin Charles Scorsese was born on November 17, 1942 in Queens, New York City, to Catherine Scorsese (née Cappa) and Charles Scorsese, who both worked in Manhattan's garment district, and whose families both came from Palermo, Sicily. He was raised in the neighborhood of Little Italy, which later ...

The Last Temptation of Christ Hugo The Last Waltz Silence Taxi Driver Mean Streets The Age of Innocence The Irishman

31. Edward Yang

Writer | Yi yi

Born on November 6, 1947 in Shanghai, China, Edward Yang has become one of the most talented international filmmakers of his generation. Along with Hou Hsiao-Hsien and Tsai Ming-Liang, Yang ranks among the leading artists of the Taiwanese New Wave, and one of the world's most brilliant auteurs. ...

Gu ling jie shao nian sha ren shi jian / A Brighter Summer Day Qing mei zhu ma / Taipei Story Yi yi

32. Chantal Akerman

Director | Les rendez-vous d'Anna

Chantal Akerman was born on June 6, 1950 in Brussels, Belgium. She was a director and writer, known for The Meetings of Anna (1978), I, You, He, She (1974) and A Couch in New York (1996). She was married to Sonia Wieder-Atherton. She died on October 5, 2015 in Paris, France.

Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles Je tu il elle Toute une nuit D'Est

33. Tex Avery

Director | I Love to Singa

Tex Avery was a descendant of Judge Roy Bean and Daniel Boone, but all his grandma ever told him about it was "Don't ever mention you are kin to Roy Bean. He's a no good skunk!!" After graduating from North Dallas High School in 1927, Avery moved to Southern California in 1929 and got a job in the ...

Dumb-Hounded King-Size Canary Deputy Droopy The Big Snooze

34. Luis Buñuel

Writer | Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie

The father of cinematic Surrealism and one of the most original directors in the history of the film medium, Luis Buñuel was given a strict Jesuit education (which sowed the seeds of his obsession with both religion and subversive behavior), and subsequently moved to Madrid to study at the ...

Le fantôme de la liberté / The Phantom of Liberty Los olvidados / The Young and the Damned L'âge d'or / Age of Gold Un chien andalou

35. Charles Chaplin

Writer | The Great Dictator

Considered to be one of the most pivotal stars of the early days of Hollywood, Charlie Chaplin lived an interesting life both in his films and behind the camera. He is most recognized as an icon of the silent film era, often associated with his popular character, the Little Tramp; the man with the ...

City Lights Monsieur Verdoux The Kid Modern Times The Gold Rush

36. Jacques Demy

Soundtrack | Les parapluies de Cherbourg

Jacques Demy was born on June 5, 1931 in Pontchâteau, Loire-Atlantique, France. He was a director and writer, known for The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967) and A Room in Town (1982). He was married to Agnès Varda. He died on October 27, 1990 in Paris, France.

Les demoiselles de Rochefort / The Young Girls of Rochefort Les parapluies de Cherbourg / The Umbrellas of Cherbourg Lola

37. Aleksandr Dovzhenko

Writer | Zemlya

Aleksandr Dovzhenko was born on September 10, 1894 in Vyunishche, Sosnitsa Ueyzd, Chernigov Governorate, Russian Empire [now Sosnitsa, Sosnitsa Raion, Chernihiv Oblast, Ukraine]. He was a writer and director, known for Earth (1930), Shors (1939) and Life in Bloom (1949). He was married to Yuliya ...

Zemlya / Earth Zvenigora Arsenal Ivan

38. Clint Eastwood

Actor | Million Dollar Baby

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

The Bridges of Madison County The Outlaw Josey Wales White Hunter Black Heart Unforgiven Million Dollar Baby J. Edgar Hereafter

39. Dave Fleischer

Director | Mr. Bug Goes to Town

Dave Fleischer was an American film producer and director of animated films. He co-founded the animation studio Fleischer Studios (1929-1942) with his brother Max Fleischer. Dave is primarily remembered for directing the studio's only two feature films: "Gulliver's Travels" (1939) and "Mr. Bug Goes...

Bimbo's Initiation Swing You Sinners! Snow-White Betty Boop's Bamboo Isle Betty Boop's Penthouse

40. Terry Gilliam

Writer | Brazil

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

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen Brazil Monty Python and the Holy Grail Twelve Monkeys

41. Howard Hawks

Director | Red River

What do the classic films Scarface (1932), Twentieth Century (1934), Bringing Up Baby (1938), Only Angels Have Wings (1939), His Girl Friday (1940), Sergeant York (1941), To Have and Have Not (1944), The Big Sleep (1946), Red River (1948) Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) and Rio Bravo (1959) have in...

His Girl Friday The Big Sleep Only Angels Have Wings Red River Bringing Up Baby

42. Werner Herzog

Director | Fitzcarraldo

Director. Writer. Producer. Actor. Poet. He studied history, literature and theatre for some time, but didn't finish it and founded instead his own film production company in 1963. Later in his life, Herzog also staged several operas in Bayreuth, Germany, and at the Milan Scala in Italy. Herzog has...

Land des Schweigens und der Dunkelheit / Land of Silence and Darkness Aguirre, der Zorn Gottes / Aguirre, the Wrath of God Lektionen in Finsternis / Lessons of Darkness Grizzly Man Fitzcarraldo

43. Hsiao-Hsien Hou

Producer | Cike Nie Yin Niang

Of the ten films that Hsiao-Hsien Hou directed between 1980 and 1989, seven received best film or best director awards from prestigious international films festivals in Venice, Berlin, Hawaii, and the Festival of the Three Continents in Nantes. In a 1988 worldwide critics' poll, Hou was championed ...

Xi meng ren sheng / The Puppetmaster Hao nan hao nu / Good Men, Good Women Tóngnián wangshì / A Time to Live and a Time to Die Dong dong de jiàqi / A Summer and Grandpa's Beiqíng chéngshì / A City of Sadness Ci ke Nie Yin Niang / The Assassin

44. Buster Keaton

Actor | The General

Joseph Frank Keaton was born on October 4, 1895 in Piqua, Kansas, to Joe Keaton and Myra Keaton. Joe and Myra were Vaudevillian comedians with a popular, ever-changing variety act, giving Keaton an eclectic and interesting upbringing. In the earliest days on stage, they traveled with a medicine ...

The General Sherlock Jr. Our Hospitality The Play House The Cameraman Cops

45. Krzysztof Kieslowski

Writer | Trois couleurs: Bleu

Krzysztof Kieslowski graduated from Lódz Film School in 1969, and became a documentary, TV and feature film director and scriptwriter. Before making his first film for TV, Przejscie podziemne (1974) (The Underground Passage), he made a number of short documentaries. His next TV title, Personnel (...

Trois couleurs: Rouge / Three Colors: Red Krótki film o milosci / A Short Film About Love Dekalog La double vie de Véronique / The Double Life of Veronique Krótki film o zabijaniu / A Short Film About Killing

46. Ernst Lubitsch

Director | To Be or Not to Be

From Ernst Lubitsch's experiences in Sophien Gymnasium (high school) theater, he decided to leave school at the age of 16 and pursue a career on the stage. He had to compromise with his father and keep the account books for the family tailor business while he acted in cabarets and music halls at ...

The Shop Around the Corner Die Puppe / The Doll Trouble in Paradise Cluny Brown Die Bergkatze / The Wildcat

47. Anthony Mann

Director | El Cid

Anthony Mann was born on June 30, 1906 in San Diego, California, USA. He was a director and writer, known for El Cid (1961), Men in War (1957) and The Glenn Miller Story (1954). He was married to Anna, Sara Montiel and Mildred Mann. He died on April 29, 1967 in London, England.

Devil's Doorway Raw Deal The Naked Spur Man of the West The Far Country The Fall of the Roman Empire Winchester '73

48. F.W. Murnau

Director | Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans

F.W. Murnau was a German film director. He was greatly influenced by Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Shakespeare and Ibsen plays he had seen at the age of 12, and became a friend of director Max Reinhardt. During World War I he served as a company commander at the eastern front and was in the German air ...

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens Der letzte Mann / The Last Laugh

49. Manoel de Oliveira

Director | Os Canibais

Manoel de Oliveira was born on December 11, 1908 in Oporto, Portugal. He was a director and writer, known for The Cannibals (1988), I'm Going Home (2001) and Christopher Columbus, the Enigma (2007). He was married to Maria Isabel Brandão de Meneses de Almeida Carvalhais. He died on April 2, 2015 in...

Amor de Perdição: Memórias de uma Família / Doomed Love 'Non', ou A Vã Glória de Mandar / No, Or the Vain Glory of Command Inquietude Le soulier de satin / The Satin Slipper

50. Max Ophüls

Director | La ronde

Director Max Ophüls was born Max Oppenheimer in Saarbrücken, Germany. He began his career as a stage actor and director in the golden twenties. He worked in cities such as Stuttgart, Dortmund, Wuppertal, Vienna, Frankfurt, Breslau and Berlin. In 1929 his son Marcel Ophüls was born in Frankfurt, ...

The Reckless Moment Letter From an Unknown Woman Madame de... Lola Montès

51. Jafar Panahi

Director | Taxi

Jafar Panahi (Born 11 July 1960) is an Iranian film director, screenwriter, and film editor, commonly identified with the Iranian New Wave film movement. After several years of making short films and working as an assistant director for fellow Iranian film-maker Abbas Kiarostami, Panahi achieved ...

Dayereh / The Circle Ayneh / The Mirror Khers nist / No Bears Pardé / Closed Curtain Taxi In film nist / This is Not a Film

52. Satyajit Ray

Writer | Pather Panchali

Satyajit Ray was born in Calcutta on May 2, 1921. His father, Late Sukumar Ray was an eminent poet and writer in the history of Bengali literature. In 1940, after receiving his degree in science and economics from Calcutta University, he attended Tagore's Viswa-Bharati University. His first movie ...

Charulata Apur Sansar / World of Apu Pather Panchali Aparajito Jalsaghar / The Music Room

53. Josef von Sternberg

Director | The Devil Is a Woman

Josef von Sternberg split his childhood between Vienna and New York City. His father, a former soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army, could not support his family in either city; Sternberg remembered him only as "an enormously strong man who often used his strength on me." Forced by poverty to drop ...

Anatahan The Devil is a Woman The Docks of New York The Last Command The Scarlet Empress

54. Béla Tarr

Producer | Werckmeister harmóniák

Béla Tarr was born on July 21, 1955 in Pécs, Hungary. He is a producer and director, known for Werckmeister Harmonies (2000), The Turin Horse (2011) and Satantango (1994). He is married to Ágnes Hranitzky.

Sátántangó Werckmeister harmóniák / Werckmeister Harmonies A torinói ló / The Turin Horse Kárhozat / Damnation

55. Jacques Tati

Writer | Playtime

The comic genius Jacques Tati was born Taticheff, descended from a noble Russian family. His grandfather, Count Dimitri, had been a general in the Imperial Army and had served as military attaché to the Russian Embassy in Paris. His father, Emmanuel Taticheff, was a well-to-do picture framer who ...

Playtime Mon oncle Jour de fête

56. Jacques Tourneur

Director | Cat People

Born in Paris in 1904, Tourneur went to Hollywood with his father, director Maurice Tourneur around 1913. He started out as a script clerk and editor for his father, then graduated to such jobs as directing shorts (often with the pseudonym Jack Turner), both in France and America. He was hired to ...

Out of the Past Wichita Night of the Demon Cat People

57. Tomu Uchida

Director | Tsuchi

Tomu Uchida was born on April 26, 1898 in Okayama, Okayama, Japan. He was a director and actor, known for Earth (1939), A Fugitive from the Past (1965) and Miyamoto Musashi VI (1971). He died on August 7, 1970 in Japan.

Kiga kaikyô / A Fugitive From the Past Tsuchi / Earth Chiyari Fuji / Bloody Spear at Mount Fuji

58. Dziga Vertov

Director | Chelovek s kino-apparatom

Dziga Vertov was born on January 2, 1896 in Bialystok, Grodno Governorate, Russian Empire [now Podlaskie, Poland]. He was a director and writer, known for Man with a Movie Camera (1929), Three Songs About Lenin (1934) and The Sixth Part of the World (1926). He was married to Elizaveta Svilova. He ...

Chelovek s kino-apparatom / Man With a Movie Camera Tri pesni o Lenine / Three Songs About Lenin Entuziazm (Simfoniya Donbassa) / Enthusiasm

59. Peter Watkins

Director | The War Game

Peter Watkins began his career in advertising as an assistant producer and turned to amateur filmmaking in the late 1950s. In the mid-'60s he was commissioned by BBC-TV to make two feature-length docudramas incorporating a quasi-newsreel style and nonprofessional actors. The second of these, The ...

Edvard Munch La commune (Paris, 1871) The Forgotten Faces

60. Wim Wenders

Director | Der Himmel über Berlin

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

Der Himmel über Berlin / Wings of Desire Alice in den Städten / Alice in the Cities Paris, Texas

61. Thom Andersen

Director | Los Angeles Plays Itself

Thom Andersen was born in 1943 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He is a director and writer, known for Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003), The Thoughts That Once We Had (2015) and Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer (1975).

Los Angeles Plays Itself The Thoughts That Once We Had

62. Theodoros Angelopoulos

Director | Mia aioniotita kai mia mera

Theo Angelopoulos began to study law in Athens but broke up his studies to go to the Sorbonne in Paris in order to study literature. When he had finished his studies, he wanted to attend the School of Cinema at Paris but decided instead to go back to Greece. There he worked as a journalist and ...

O thiasos / The Traveling Players Taxidi sta Kythira / Voyage to Cythera

63. Kenneth Anger

Director | Fireworks

Kenneth Anger grew up in Hollywood and started out as a child actor, but his interest in filmmaking was evident at an early age: he made his first film, Who Has Been Rocking My Dreamboat (1941) , at age 14.

Anger developed into one of the pioneers of the American underground film movement. His ...

Lucifer Rising Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome Scorpio Rising

64. Michelangelo Antonioni

Writer | Blow-Up

Together with Fellini, Bergman and Kurosawa, Michelangelo Antonioni is credited with defining the modern art film. And yet Antonioni's cinema is also recognized today for defying any easy categorization, with his films ultimately seeming to belong to their own distinctive genre. Indeed, the ...

Blow-Up Zabriskie Point Lo sguardo di Michelangelo / Michelangelo Eye to Eye L'avventure L'eclisse

65. Jordan Belson

Visual_effects | The Right Stuff

Jordan Belson was born on June 6, 1926 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Jordan was a director and producer, known for The Right Stuff (1983), LSD (1962) and Séance (1959). Jordan died on September 6, 2011 in San Francisco, California, USA.

Mysterious Journey Allures

66. Ingmar Bergman

Writer | Smultronstället

Ernst Ingmar Bergman was born July 14, 1918, the son of a priest. The film and T.V. series, The Best Intentions (1992) is biographical and shows the early marriage of his parents. The film Sunday's Children (1992) depicts a bicycle journey with his father. In the miniseries Private Confessions (...

Persona Det sjunde inseglet / The Seventh Seal Tystnaden / The Silence

67. Budd Boetticher

Director | Bullfighter and the Lady

Brilliant, distinguished American director, particularly of Westerns, whose simple, bleak style disguises a complex artistic temperament. The adopted son of a wealthy hardware retailer, Boetticher attended Culver Military Academy and Ohio State University, where he excelled in football and boxing.

...

Comanche Station Ride Lonesome The Tall T 7 Men From Now

68. Frank Borzage

Director | Bad Girl

Frank Borzage was born on April 23, 1894 in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. He was an actor and director, known for Bad Girl (1931), 7th Heaven (1927) and No Greater Glory (1934). He was married to Juanita Scott, Edna Skelton and Rena Rogers. He died on June 19, 1962 in Hollywood, Los Angeles, ...

Lucky Star 7th Heaven Lazybones

69. Albert Brooks

Actor | Drive

Albert Brooks was born on July 22, 1947 in Beverly Hills, California, USA. He is an actor and writer, known for Drive (2011), Broadcast News (1987) and Defending Your Life (1991). He has been married to Kimberly Shlain since March 15, 1997. They have two children.

Defending Your Life Real Life Modern Romance

70. Charles Burnett

Director | Killer of Sheep

Born in Vicksburg, Mississippi on April 13, 1944, Charles Burnett moved with his family to the Watts area of Los Angeles at an early age. He describes the community of having a robust mythical connection with the South as a result of having so many Southern transplants, an atmosphere which has ...

My Brother's Wedding Killer of Sheep When It Rains To Sleep With Anger

71. Youssef Chahine

Director | Iskanderija... lih?

Youssef Chahine (born in Alexandria, Egypt, 1926) started studying in a friars' school, and then turned to Victoria College until the High School Certificate. After one year in the University of Alexandria, he moved to the U.S. and spent two years at the Pasadena Play House, taking courses on film ...

Bab el hadid / Cairo Station Iskanderija... lih? / Alexandria, Why? Siraa Fil-Wadi / Struggle in the Valley

72. Damien Chazelle

Writer | La La Land

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

La La Land Whiplash Babylon

73. Robert Clampett

Director | Time for Beany

Born in San Diego, California, the young Robert Clampett was monumentally moved as a child by the film The Lost World (1925), inspiring him to create a sea-serpent sock-puppet that he used in puppet shows to entertain the neighborhood kids. This led him to create a stuffed Mickey Mouse toy, which ...

Porky in Wackyland The Great Piggy Bank Robbery A Corny Concerto

74. David Cronenberg

Actor | The Fly

David Cronenberg, also known as the King of Venereal Horror or the Baron of Blood, was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in 1943. His father, Milton Cronenberg, was a journalist and editor, and his mother, Esther (Sumberg), was a piano player. After showing an inclination for literature at an early...

Naked Lunch Videodrome A History of Violence Cosmopolis

75. Maya Deren

Director | Meshes of the Afternoon

Maya Deren came to the USA in 1922 as Eleanora Derenkowsky. Together with her father Solomon Derenkowsky, a psychiatrist, and her mother Maria Fidler, an artist, she fled the pogroms organized by the Bolsheviks against the Jews. She studied journalism and political science at the Syracuse ...

Meshes of the Afternoon At Land Ritual in Transfigured Time

76. Xavier Dolan

Actor | J'ai tué ma mère

Xavier Dolan was born on March 20, 1989 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He is an actor and producer, known for I Killed My Mother (2009), Tom at the Farm (2013) and Heartbeats (2010).

Laurence Anyways J'ai tué ma mère Les amours imaginaires

77. Sergei Eisenstein

Director | Ivan Groznyy

The son of an affluent architect, Eisenstein attended the Institute of Civil Engineering in Petrograd as a young man. With the fall of the tsar in 1917, he worked as an engineer for the Red Army. In the following years, Eisenstein joined up with the Moscow Proletkult Theater as a set designer and ...

78. Cy Endfield

Director | Zulu

The son of a struggling businessman, Cy Endfield--born Cyril Raker Endfield--worked hard to be admitted to Yale University in 1933. While completing his education he became enamored with progressive theatre and appeared in a New Haven production of a minor Russian play in 1934. He was also ...

Zulu The Sound of Fury AKA Try and Get Me! The Argyle Secrets Sands of the Kalahari

79. Oskar Fischinger

Cinematographer | Frau im Mond

Oskar Fischinger was born on June 22, 1900 in Gelnhausen, Hesse, Germany. He was a director, known for Woman in the Moon (1929), Orgelstäbe (1927) and A Quarter Hour of City Statistics (1933). He was married to Elfriede Fischinger. He died on January 31, 1967 in Hollywood, California, USA.

80. Hollis Frampton

Director | Not the First Time

Hollis Frampton was born on March 11, 1936 in Wooster, Ohio, USA. He was a director and producer, known for Not the First Time (1976), The Birth of Magellan: Cadenza XIV (1980) and The Birth of Magellan: Mindfall I (1980). He died on March 30, 1984 in New York, USA.

Hapax Legomena I: Nostalgia Zorns Lemma States

81. Samuel Fuller

Writer | Shock Corridor

At age 17, Samuel Fuller was the youngest reporter ever to be in charge of the events section of the New York Journal. After having participated in the European battle theater in World War II, he directed some minor action productions for which he mostly wrote the scripts himself and which he also ...

White Dog The Naked Kiss Shock Corridor

82. Ebrahim Golestan

Director | Khesht va Ayeneh

Ebrahim Golestan is an Iranian filmmaker and literary figure with a career spanning half a century. He has lived in Sussex, United Kingdom, since 1975. He was closely associated with the controversial and eminent Iranian poet Forough Farrokhzad until her death, whom he met at his studio in 1958. He...

Khesht va Ayeneh / Brick and Mirror Asrar ganj dareheye jenni / The Ghost Valley's Treasure Mysteries Tappe-haye Marlik / The Hills of Marlik

83. Ritwik Ghatak

Director | Jukti, Takko Aar Gappo

Ritwik Ghatak was born on November 4, 1925 in Dacca, Bengal Presidency, British India [now in Dhaka, Bangladesh]. He was a director and writer, known for Jukti, Takko Aar Gappo (1974), Musafir (1957) and The Cloud-Capped Star (1960). He was married to Surama Ghatak. He died on February 6, 1976 in ...

84. D.W. Griffith

Director | The Birth of a Nation

David Wark Griffith was born in rural Kentucky to Jacob "Roaring Jake" Griffith, a former Confederate Army colonel and Civil War veteran. Young Griffith grew up with his father's romantic war stories and melodramatic nineteenth-century literature that were to eventually shape his movies. In 1897 ...

85. Jim Jarmusch

Director | Paterson

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

Dead Man Paterson The Limits of Control

86. Jon Jost

Director | They Had It Coming

Born in Chicago in 1943, of a military family, Jost grew up in Georgia, Kansas, Japan, Italy, Germany, and, Virginia. Expelled from college in 1963, He began making 16mm films. He is self-taught. He has made some 20 shorts and 16 feature films, all of which he has conceived, written, photographed, ...

Angel City Frameup All the Vermeers in New York

87. Teinosuke Kinugasa

Director | Jigokumon

Former female impersonator who entered films in 1917 as an actor, turned to directing in 1922 and made some of the most formally brilliant Japanese films of the following decades. The few of Kinugasa's early works to have reached the West betray a highly mature, sophisticated talent. His best-known...

Kurutta ippêji / A Page of Madness Jigokumon / Gate of Hell Jûjiro

88. Lev Kuleshov

Director | Po zakonu

Lev Kuleshov was a Russian director who used the editing technique known as the "Kuleshov effect." Although some of the editing innovations, such as crosscutting were used by other directors before him, Kuleshov was the first to use it in the Soviet Russia. he was driving a Ford sports car amidst ...

Velikiy uteshitel / The Great Consoler Po zakonu / By the Law

89. Akira Kurosawa

Writer | Kakushi-toride no san-akunin

After training as a painter (he storyboards his films as full-scale paintings), Kurosawa entered the film industry in 1936 as an assistant director, eventually making his directorial debut with Sanshiro Sugata (1943). Within a few years, Kurosawa had achieved sufficient stature to allow him greater...

90. Spike Lee

Director | Do the Right Thing

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

Do the Right Thing When the Levees Broke 25th Hour

91. Lee Chang-dong

Writer | Beoning

Lee Chang-Dong was born in 1954 in Daegu, which some consider the most right-wing city in South Korea. Lee is a former high-school teacher and an acclaimed novelist. He turned to cinema when he was over 40 years old. His debut film "Green Fish" (1997) brought immediate success and critical acclaim....

92. Mohsen Makhmalbaf

Writer | Gabbeh

Mohsen Makhmalbaf is known as one of the most influential filmmakers and founders of the new wave of Iranian cinema in the world today.

Many of his films like Salam Cinema, A Moment Of Innocence, Gabbeh, Kandahar and The President have been widely well received across the globe and have brought him ...

Nun va Guldoon / A Moment of Innocence Nassereddin Shah, Actor-e Cinema / Once Upon a Time, Cinema

93. Chris Marker

Writer | 12 Monkeys

Chris Marker was born on July 29, 1921 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hauts-de-Seine, France. He was a writer and director, known for 12 Monkeys (1995), Sans Soleil (1983) and Third Side of the Coin (1960). He died on July 29, 2012 in Paris, France.

La jetée Sans soleil

94. Leo McCarey

Director | An Affair to Remember

Leo McCarey was born on October 3, 1896 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was a director and writer, known for An Affair to Remember (1957), Going My Way (1944) and Love Affair (1939). He was married to Virginia Stella Martin. He died on July 5, 1969 in Santa Monica, California, USA.

Duck Soup Make Way for Tomorrow An Affair to Remember

95. Georges Méliès

Director | À la conquête du pôle

Georges Méliès was a French illusionist and film director famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest days of cinema.

Méliès was an especially prolific innovator in the use of special effects, popularizing such techniques as substitution splices, multiple exposures, ...

96. Sergei Parajanov

Director | Tini zabutykh predkiv

One of the 20th century's greatest masters of cinema Sergei Parajanov was born in Georgia to Armenian parents and it was always unlikely that his work would conform to the strict socialist realism that Soviet authorities preferred. After studying film and music, Parajanov became an assistant ...

97. Mark Rappaport

Director | From the Journals of Jean Seberg

Mark Rappaport is known for From the Journals of Jean Seberg (1995), The Scenic Route (1978) and Rock Hudson's Home Movies (1992).

98. Mohammad Rasoulof

Director | Dast-neveshtehaa nemisoosand

Mohammad Rasoulof was born in Shiraz, Iran in 1972. He is an independent director, writer and producer. He studied sociology. Rasoulof started his filmmaking with documentaries and short films. For his first film 'Gagooman'(The Twilight, 2002) Rasoulof won the prize for the best film at the Fajr ...

99. Éric Rohmer

Director | Ma nuit chez Maud

Admirers have always had difficulty explaining Éric Rohmer's "Je ne sais quoi." Part of the challenge stems from the fact that, despite his place in French Nouvelle Vague (i.e., New Wave), his work is unlike that of his colleagues. While this may be due to the auteur's unwillingness to conform, ...

100. Ousmane Sembene

Writer | Moolaadé

The first film director from an African country to achieve international recognition, Ousmane Sembene remains the major figure in the rise of an independent post-colonial African cinema. Sembene's roots were not, as might be expected, in the educated élite. After working as a mechanic and ...

Moolaadé Xala La noire de... / Black Girl Ceddo