Anyway, I don't know if he's the best director, but I am a fan of Clint Eastwood's movies. Unforgiven, Million Dollar Baby . . . great flicks. Clint is getting better and better as time goes by.
I think different directors have different talents.
Spielberg has a terrific capacity to capture the pure emotions of children, and for storytelling.
I think Ron Howard has a gift for translating a story for the big screen and telling a story that is bigger than the characters.
I love the way Tarantino uses music in a way that really adds a great vibe to the stories he's telling, along with his method of piecing a story together in a non-linear fashion without making it feel herky-jerky. Tarantino also has a great feel for the use of dialog to give his characters greater depth and make them more real.
George Lucas has a talent for special effects, and, well, not much else as far as I can tell.
There are others that I have enjoyed; Ang Lee, Guy Ritchie, John Frankenheimer, Eastwood, to name but a few.
Hitchcock
Kurosawa
Goddard
Milos Forman
Brian De Palma
David Cronenberg
Francis Ford Coppola
Robert Zemeckis
Sergio Leone
Joel Coen
Martin Scorsese
James Cameron
Brad Bird
Michael Mann
M. Night Shyamalan
P.T. Anderson
Michael Gondry
Luc Besson
Quentin Tarantino
Ridley Scott
Tim Burton
Bryan Singer
And in terms of technical direction, Joel Coen, Robert Zemeckis and James Cameron are on par with Kubrick if not better.
Ok MEBossy please explain the reasons for putting James Cameron, Michel Gondry, Ridley Scott, Tim Burton and Bryan Singer above Kubric...
I would put the direction it took to make Dr. Strangelove ahead of anything Michel Gondry Made. Granted The man does make some technically great music videos but comparing and made one good movie I've seen (can't speak for the others) but a 4 minute short can't compare with the quality portfolio Kubric has amassed.
James Cameron- Also a good director, but, I think, he rellies on huge budgets to make his movies great. You look at all his movies (aside from Pirhanna Two) and not one of them has a reasonable budget. Kubric did more with less. I would say Kubric has made just as many memorable scenes as Cameron with 1/5 of the budget if that.
Ridley Scott - I'm trying to understand where this one came from, Blade Runner and Alien, two obviously great movies however comparatively can they really compare to, Full Metal Jacket, 2001, Eyes wide shut?
Bryan Singer - Out of all these guys this seems, to me the most out of place. The only movie I would put near on par with the quality of movies the rest of these guys put out would be Usual Suspects... That was a great movie. But I don't think One movie qualifies him to be put in the same list as Kurosawa and Hitchcock...
Tim Burton - Out of the ones I've picked out I do agree Tim Burton is an excellent director. His claymation work requires absolute control and technical expertise. However if you look what he does with humans and a big budget you get a not so hot response.... Planet of the Apes is a prime example.
I think a good measure of a director is the ability to bring no name actors to the screen and have them be spectacular. If you look in many Kubric movies, especially full metal jacket, you see just this. Cameron, Scott, Singer, Burton have all relied on a stable of good to great actors to keep their movies going.
Burton - Johnny Depp 'nuff said
Singer - Pulled together a crazy star studded cast in usual suspects and then had some big names in X-men and X2
Cameron - Jesus he's had to many big names to mention and kinda relied on them in every movie to make it go... He and Arnie made each other.
Ridley Scott - Harrison Ford, Rusell Crow, Nicholas Cage... the list goes on.
I think that this in itself should catapult Kubric at least on the list. 2001, Clockwork Orange, Full metal Jacket, even The shining, at the time Nicholson had done cuckoos nest and easy rider the nest is the only one where he had a large part, all with less then notable actors.
Of course your list with Hitchcock and Kurosawa at the top is a ok with me... and I have to admit there are a couple I'm not to familiar with on the list... but there is my two cents... Enjoy!
Wasn't apt pupil a Stephen King story? I think it was maybe.
As much as Kubrick has made some great films. I thought 2001 and Eyes Wide Shut were complete dogs. Eyes Wide Shut has to be one of my top 5 worst movies that I have ever watched from start to finish.
Of course Spielberg made that 1942 41 something like that movie which sucked eggs as well.
Funny, 2001 and Eyes Wide Shut happen to be two of my favorite Kubrick Films.
Eyes wide shut seemed to have a classic style of suspense and foreboding danger (to me anyway); an unusual amount of intimacy and interaction with the audience; a welcome change from his usual patented detachment and coldness (watching his movies is sometimes like visiting an art museum; you're not allowed to touch anything, you must appreciate it from afar). In the story, Tom Cruise's character seems a far more relatable earthling than most of the other characters in Kubrick films. While whats going on around him may be incredibly surreal the connection between the audience and the main character here seems quite straight forward. We share his nervousness, embarrasment and paranoia with a normalcy and at regulated intervals; in contrast, Kubrick hardly ever allowed his audience to relate to a character while understanding him.
My list of directors is a "best of" list but I dont consider them all greater than Kubrick of course!
I put them in order from best to least best. Some of these guys I consider the holy grail of their genre but others I just put up there because I think they're generally underrated and unsung/ underexposed and created films that deserve as much accolades as anything the Spielbergs and Kubricks and garnered even if ultimately they are not as great. Bryan Singer is on the list because hes still fairly young and done very few films and done exceptional work with them.
I would like to add that I think Annaud is a good director.
I also really like Kurosawa.
I think David Fincher is overlooked.
I like all the responses otherwise, though.
This discourse is great, but I am having a really hard time understanding why Kubrick isn't at least in the top 5 of anyone's list. Dr. Strangelove is one of the finest examples of any film of any time (Jesus, Peter Sellers at his freakin' best(and as Jesus (walkin' on water and all)!). I can see that this may cause an issue in some people's mind, and I know I said "there can be no argument", but I'm just asking for top 5! I am watching Clockwork Orange right now and I becoming even more jaded to the responses ...
This discourse is great, but I am having a really hard time understanding why Kubrick isn't at least in the top 5 of anyone's list. Dr. Strangelove is one of the finest examples of any film of any time (Jesus, Peter Sellers at his freakin' best). I can see that this may cause an issue in some people's mind, and I know I said "there can be no argument", but I'm just asking for top 5! I am watching Clockwork Orange right now and I becoming even more jaded to the responses ...
OOOO ok mebossy sorry... It just really blew my mind when he wasn't on but yeah I can't pick out a director on your list that I don't like... I think maybe Terri Gilliam and David Lynch might make it on my list though.... ok back to sleep off a hangover...
Am I the only person who thought that Kill Bill sucked? How about From Dusk 'Till Dawn?
I liked many of his other films, but he's made a few that just don't work at all for me. Spielburg may have made a couple of turkeys in his time, but a movie like Schindler's List makes Kill Bill look like . . . . well . . . not much of a movie to be honest.
Azusa, this might be the only time that you and I wholeheartedly disagree, as I am sure that I have gone off on a tangent here and there regarding the genius that IS 'Kill Bill, Vol. 1', I won't delve into the proclivities. In fact, 'Kill Bill' helps my argument that every person has one (and only one) movie out there suited perfectly for them. For example:
My old roommate from college: Loves the 80s; Loves lots of action with little dialogue; Loves Lea Thomson -so the movie perfectly suited for him is: 'Red Dawn'
An 'ex of mine: Came from a broken home; Has an unhealthy fixation on violence; has a propensity to be 'different' - thus her flick is 'A Clockwork Orange'
An old teammate of mine from the Rowing Team: Staunch German heritage; Is ridiculously unapologetic; Is unquestionably a latent homosexual - his prefect movie (which he freely admits): 'Cabaret'
Me: Love (well done) Kung Fu type flicks; Love blonde amazonian women; Love flicks in which 'has been' actors get a second chance at the mainstream - thus: 'Kill Bill'.
M.D. I watched it and it did nothing at all for me. You said why you liked it. Here are some of the reasons I didn't like it . . .
I felt as though Tarantino was simply re-hashing a lot of what he'd done before in Resevoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, and Jackie Brown. The only problem was that for whatever reason I didn't get a chuckle out of any of it, I didn't find it cool or engaging at all. Maybe the only part I did think was sort of funny was when she kicked the crap out of the guy that had been abusing her in the hospital bed. That scene sort of reminded me of similar jokey scenes from Resevoir Dogs or Pulp Fiction.
Perhaps the reason I didn't find it cool or funny was that though a lot of the scenes and situations in Pulp Fiction and Resevoir Dogs are basically implausable, they have on some level a form of believability if you are willing to suspend it to some extent. In Kill Bill there is nothing really believable at all about any of the scenarios. It was like he filmed a comic book is all. I thought either a Stallone or Schwarzennager movie had the record for body count, but Kill Bill must dwarf even a live-action cartoon like Schwarzennager's Commando. Jackie Chan or Bruce Lee movies involve the main protagonist beating up thousands of extras - true, but having their blood pour all over the place? Even the silly chambara samurai pics don't seem anywhere near the human abbatoir that Kill Bill was.
I found the level of gore and violence gratuitous. It served no purpose in telling the story (in as much as there was one). Kill Bill has no plot really except that the girl played by Uma Thurman wants revenge so she kills a lot of people. She flies to Japan without a visa, and knows how to speak great Japanese (something that has alluded me for 11 years). Perhaps I was looking for some sort of explanations about some of these things, but it was like grasping at straws. Because everyone was basically a cardboard cutout archetype of some movie that Tarantino thought was great when he was 14 or whatever, there was 0 interest for me in any of the characters. I didn't care if the girl succeeded in revenge or not, because by a third of the way through the movie I could care less any way.
The Japanese elements: cheesy. I can speak reasonably OKish Japanese - Lucy Liu cannot. I couldn't really get over her accent. She's playing someone who is supposed to be a female oyabun, but she can't speak the language properly. I thought the backstory about her using anime was too long and gory and pointless.
I recognize that the movie is meant as a hommage by Tarantino to some of his favourite genres, and is not plot driven at all. For you Marc, I guess it fit the bill. However, for me it was a mess of a movie. I was watching it in the company of a few people who said at the end that they couldn't wait for Kill Bill Part II. I politely said that I was OK. Really though, I don't think that Kill Bill is a movie that distinguishes Tarantino as a great director in the tradition of Scorcese, Coppola or Spielburg.
Finally, I will add (no doubt this will cause others to disagree with me as well), I think Dr. Strangelove was an OK movie, but far from great; it certainly isn't Seller's best performance. I think Full Metal Jacket was a good movie, but 2001 was sort of so so. I wouldn't really put Kubrick on a list of greatest directors personally.
You mentioned that Kill Bill seems like a filmed comic book.
Thats absolutely right and it happens to be intentionally just that (and just for the record, a comic book put on film does not automacally a bad movie make, i.e. Sin City; just in case that was what you were implying).
There are two major U.S. studio pictures so far that have been crafted in this live action MAnga comics format. The Matrix and Kill Bill Part I.
This is hyperrealistic fantasy. The movie is not SUPPOSED to allow suspension of disbelief; the outrageously silly technics that disperse blood from a decapitated head like a squirt gun are prime examples. Every ridiculous exaggeration in the movie's "gratuitousness" is just another piece of the overall message "this is NOT real, this is playing pretend, this is cops and robbers, cowboys and indians, this is RECESS."
And recess is fun!
Its the only way you can laugh at a scene where hundreds of people get chopped up like sushi.
IF movies like Donner's Superman, Chris Nolan's Batman Begins, and Singer's X-men are intended to bring comic book movies to a more realistic core than Kill Bill is a glorious celebration of the exact opposite; a movie in which exaggeration is the native toungue
and the only characters that can survive in the natural habitat of extremeties that this movie is, are caricatures; the most unlikely individuals who live unliveable lives and die unimaginable deaths, sometimes for absolutely no significant reason other than to be in keeping with the situation.
Tarantino responds to similar attacks on the plausability of these characters by saying: "Anyone who thinks for a minute that any of these characters are supposed to be real people are totally out of their minds."
In fact Part I is supposed to work as a mythology setup. Since quentin was fascinated with contemporary mythology that exists mostly in (lets face it) comic books, he made this film as a mythology/origin story that tells you nothing of these characters as actual people (that happens in part II) but of the mythology of these uberwarriors that play on the level of legends of the ancient greek gods. This is the wild wild west filled with its share of Wild Bills, Wyatt Earps and Women with No Names in the form of Amazonian blondes and yakuza bosses.
In fact you could title each chapter of the film as :"the legend of fill-in-the-blank". Oren Ishi, Gogo Yubari, THe man from Okinawa, Every character introduced in this story has very little to say about the plot and very much to say about his or her own backstory.
The comic book element is driven home at the end of part II where Bill declares Beatrix as a "superhero". This is the revelation of who these characters are and what this movie is essentially about in regards to its characters; a superhero trying to put her "cape and cowl" behind her but unable to because like Superman she was who she was. The relationship between Beatrix and Bill though, is of course a traditional love story.
In addition to the mythology, the movie plays like a tv series that happens to be in two volumes.
The reason why you found so little plot in the first film is because well the first film was half a movie and the half that was decidedly reserving the development of the plot for a later time.
The other reason theres so little plot is because like you pointed out this is "merely" a revenge story. And, unfortunately for you, thats all Tarantino wanted to make it at this point. A revenge story is very much its own genre that allows for little room for charater development or plot twists. Its very basic and very one-note. ITs not so much that we're following some epic journey into unknown worlds. Rather we're just informed at the beginning of one person's quest for revenge and then proceed to watch it happen. Like watching a car wreck or a natural disaster. You pretty much know the outcome of a tornado but you watch it anyway. Theres something primal-based and fascinating about watching the relentless force of nature that is human revenge because it seems to be a mindless pursuit of a subversive ideal towards justice yet it seems also to be driven beyond anything the mindful has a capacity for; in a way it shakes loose and exposes our deepest and truly first emotions to ourselves before we're able to think about them to make them more palatable. This movie is in the vein of films like Revenge or Man on Fire. Pure revenge stories without the extra "crap" people (myself included) generally need to make their movie watching experience more palatable.
I will agree Lucy Lius japanese was pathetic. I love Sophie FAtale's though. You could hear the overtones of aristocratic smarminess in her diction that those Japs are sooooo so good at. And there was even that hint of french in her tongue that allowed the rapidfire japanese syllables to roll off like honey.
There are some people who 'get' Tarantino, and others who don't. Some of us laughed our asses off when Vincent Vega accidentally blew Marvin's head off in Pulp Fiction, while others cringed. Whether Tarantino's filmaking aligns with your sensibilities or not is probably the biggest reason that people like or dislike his movies. Sure, Kill Bill Vol 1 contained some seriously over the top scenes of blood and violence. But those scenes weren't pointless. The scenes with Pai Mai were classic Kung Fu, the scenes in Japan were classic Samurai. The transitions and the ability to link the genres was pure Quentin. Since I don't speak Japanese I didn't have one problem with the respective accents of the various characters. The fact that the fight scenes in Japan included absurd arterial sprays wasn't simply gratuitous in my book, but a live action representation of the anime style in a way that I'd never seen before.
I think most of the directors listed amongst peoples favorites are all fairly skilled. Tim Burton and Terry Gilliam have a talent for the surreal. Kubrick has always fascinated me with his perspective. Hitchcock had a knack for drawing a viewer into the suspense of his films. Ridley Scott's best films have an atmosphere that you can almost taste. There are a lot of directors listed in this thread that I simply haven't seen enough of to draw an informed conclusion on, but I think it's fair to say that most of them have at least some special talents. I think that Speilberg's continuing box office success has tainted some people's opinion of his talents, which I believe to be a mistake.
Where the hell is Robert Altman in all of these lists?!?
Come on - besides P.T. Anderson's heavy-handed "Magnolia," can you name another director that can work with ensemble casts like Altman does? Take a look at "Short Cuts," "MASH" and "Nashville."
As far as Tarentino goes, hey - I'm as big a "Pulp Fiction" fan as the next guy, but I have to say that his follow-up stuff has been sub-par. And M.Night Shyamalan? That dude got lucky with that "I see dead people" movie. Everything else has been pretty much a catastrophe.
I liked Signs. I thought that the movie paced a little slow, but the movie gave us a perspective of the alien invasion concept from the view of one family in a small town without the need for huge special effects and other visuals that are the usual substitutes for story. Let's face it, if the war of the worlds scenario were to play out, most of us would be more like the scared people hiding in their basements than Will Smith flying his F-16 or Tom Cruise running all around the end of the world and not messing up his hair.
BTW
The reason Uma Thurman's character can speak japanese so well in Kill Bill is because she studied it years ago while training with Bill. Being a worldwide assassin requires a mastering of many languages Im sure. This is covered in part II. Pai Mei makes fun of Beatrix for speaking Japanese well but having lousy cantonese.
I had this huge post written the closed the window so I'll make it brief:
1 Kill Bill 1 + 2 - I enjoyed both installments but the second held more pure entertainment for me then the first. I just didn't think Uma looked good holding a sword and she did much more of that in the first one then second... also I thought it was hilarious when she was blasted with rock salt.
2 Robert Altman - I own Short cuts and Tanner 88, both I enjoyed but I don't think I've seen enough to include him on a top five or ten list. He does have a knack for making every single character on the screen hateable.
3. If I were to have a top five list (Favorites) it would go Kurosawa, Kubric, Spielberg, Gilliam, Cronenberg... I'd also like to mention Ray Harryhausen he may not be a director but he is bad ass.
I Meant to add Hitchcock would be on there but for some reason I really haven't taken the time to really study the man. I've seen a couple of his movies but buy no means his whole library. I'm working my way to him however... I guess I should start at Vertigo...
I guess I'm not much of a comic book, manga, anime fan because I didn't find Kill Bill a good movie viewing experience.
As I understand it from reading some of the posts above Tarantino is thought to be something of a genius because he was able to create a live action comic book inspired movie.
I've explained why I didn't like the movie. No plot, silly unbelievable situations, and excessive gore.
I want to watch a movie that engages me. I can see that the images in the movie are stimulating. Still, it doesn't really make up for the fact that I could've cared less about the main character after about a third of the movie was over. Had I not been in the company of others I probably would've pressed fast forward (particularly through the anime part which I found too long).
I've seen pictures of Picasso's masterpiece Guernica. I appreciate that Picasso was making a social commentary about the Spanish Civil War, but on a personal level, I don't actually think it is a particularly good piece of art. I feel the same way about much of Picasso's art. Likewise Kill Bill. The movie may have an esthetic quality that draws some people in; I don't really appreciate much about the esthetic quality of blood spraying over freshly fallen snow, or blood gushing from a head that has been cut off. I understand that it is not meant to be taken literally but there seems to be a whole subculture of otaku losers in Japan who take this stuff a bit too literally http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Issei_Sagawa I live in Japan, and the manga is replete with arty killings and completely unrealistic depictions of graphic sex acts. Every time I see salarymen reading that sort of comic I can't help but think of the atrocities commited by the Imperial Japanese army in East Asia particularly China http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_of_nanjing and that just below the civilised exterior lurks . . . . well . . . . I'm not sure. But I am digressing here and getting a bit too far off topic. Suffice it to say I'm not a big fan of this sort of thing.
By comparison I found the world of Bladerunner fascinating (and very Japanese inspired as well BTW). It is sci fi, and somewhat comic bookish I suppose. However, the world in which the story takes place contains characters that react in ways that I find plausible. There are also some interesting questions of how technology should be used that underly the story.
Yes Thatturkishguy, I saw Harrison Ford interviewed on The Actor's Studio and I think he is a really down to earth nice guy. He's probably the most humble famous person I've ever seen interviewed on TV. He seems like the kind of guy that you could just sit down and talk with, and not feel intimidated by.
However that said, I shudder at thought of what may occur should Dante Bean read your last comment about Harrison Ford. If that happens I'd recommend you go into a Witness Protection program Turk.
Well
I wouldnt call Quentin a genius because he made a live action comic book movie. To be fair Rodriguez might have done a more complete job of that with Sin City and I still regard him a much lesser director than Quentin.
Quentin's a genius in regards to his divine inspirational facilities at fresh dialogue, and his ability to lift ingredients directly from other movies and make a recipe that still tastes original.
I consider the most reward to be had from this movie comes only if you share its affection to its own material. The movie is like a young kids love letter to kung fu, yakuza, samurai, anime pictures. And I guess if you dont share that love the movie does come up emptyhanded. But this is also what I find so particularly great about Quentin's movies, which if that if you ARE a fan of the material, his movies have an incredibly unique effect of the director somehow propelling himself from the screen into your iving room and sitting next to you and watching the movie with you and discussing why this scene is great or how funny this bit of dialogue is; its very strange but his direction feels like he's directing the movie and WATCHING it at the same time; the movie REACTS to itself often; when you're watching a scene and say to yourself "wouldnt it be cool if so and so happened right now" the movie answers by saying "I agree" and then does it.
I have no problem with the movie having a revenge plot and nothing more. I like watching a beast uncaged. Aristotle's solution to plot "forget psychology, forget the insides of men's heads, judge them by what they do". And what the Bride does in this movie is kill people. She is as Bill says a natural born killer, perhaps the greatest ever lived. And the greater the killer the more primal and singleminded the agenda of killing is. To add anymore complexity to the plot would be cheating because being a truly successful killer requires a level of uncomplication, of mindlessness. Its the reason the famous theme in Jaws, the representation of the perfect underwater killing machine, was nothing but two chromatic notes repeating over and over.
Regarding the manga aspect, you have to realize that those of us who ARE fans of this stuff have been DYING for someone to get a real US live action version up on the screen. The Matrix was the first time we saw manga converted to live action and it was a huge relief towards that frustration as well as a window of oppurtunity for movies like Kill Bill; people in the US embraced the anime style even if they didnt realize thats what it was. And its not just the blood gushing parts. Its the timing, the anticipation of a killing stroke, lots of aesthetic things in which the bloodiness of the carnage is merely incidental. Of course Quentin unlike the WAchowski brothers took that idea and went bonkers with it in the last half hour of part I, because thats who he is. Thats why the movie is still recognizeable as his own movie and not just some samurai movie because he does it in a way thats funny; manga/samurai movies use very little self referential humor whereas Quentin has just about reinvented the whole concept.
ANd BTW the otaku losers you talk of are rampant in Japan over lots of things so manga is probably much more appreciable outside of Japan. Over there its like turkish delight to the japanese folk who lets face it have a huge weakness for fads, crazes, and addictions to all forms of visceral entertainment from porn to video games to violent movies. If you were living in Japan you probably couldnt even find it fun; it would be another dispassionately nihilistic excursion within your dronelike constitution. TO me japanese pop culture always seems like a virus on the brink of terminal indigestion.
Like I said before using my half-baked analogy the movie is a valentine. Quentin is very much a "like me for what I Like" kind of filmmaker. And the whole movie is like a conversation between the director and the audience like two guys having a discussion about a girl they both liked in high school. Now granted if the other guy doesnt actually like the girl to begin with, there's really nothing to discuss once she's brought up, and the movie is over almost as soon as it begins. But if her beauty caught both our eyes at one time or other, then its a discussion we've been dying to have.
Let me say to begin with the only reason I'm making this post is to bring the thread back to the left side of the screen.... but after that I'll try and add some content.
I think what makes me enjoy QT's movies the most is the content he seems to stick to. He seems to be most interested in the Killer's/criminal's honor. All of his movies involve hitmen, the Mafia, Samurai, all have complex and closely adhered to honor codes. He seems to like exploring the kind of paradoxical aspect of the criminal's morals. This usually, for me, creates a story that is pretty entertaining.
I know it was weak but ehh I had nothing to say this was a purely functional post....
O and Harrison Ford would mop the floor with The Bean. Think about it Han Solo, Indiana Jones, Jack Ryan, Rick Deckard vs Borimir and Alex Trevalyan (I'm sure he's done more things). Notice in both those he dies.... coincidence I think not!!!
