Filmmakers You Admire?

The Coen Brothers
Wong Kar-Wai
Park Chan-Wook
Kinji Fukasaku
Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Michel Gondry (though his music videos are better than his movies)
Wes Anderson
Tsang Ming-Liang (sometimes)
Hou Hsiao-Hsien (also sometimes)
Oxide & Danny Pang (they need some quality control, though)
Pedro Almodovar
Guilermo del Toro
Johnnie To (once in a while)
Wisit Sasanatieng 
Paul Greengrass

among others

combrazor, have you seen No Country For Old Men, if so what did you think?

Btw, totally agree with you on Michel Gondry

They did get recognition for Fargo though and O' Brother Where Art Though is a fan favorite. Never seen Bartopn Fink but I did like Raising Arizona.
Seriously you really need to watch NCFOM, I loved it. I've seen it in the theatres twice. It's just amazing. Only movie that came out last year Fall that I think rivals it in my mind is Assisination of Jesse James

Lol well I was thinking of Kill Bill when I mentioned cinematography but I do agree he's an awesome writer hence my love for his dialogue. Guy Ritchie too has great dislogue in his movies as well


That could be true but that didnt stop Roman Polanski or Lars Van Tier from making some amazing films

But I get what you mean, he should definitely do them in French if that's the case although I did really enjoy Enternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind.

john or is it james cameron

terminator 1 and 2, aliens , true lies . . .

george lucas - may the force be with you!

i'll try to remember the others. . .

@Seun
methinks we cannot actually give it to Mel Gibson
afterall, he had a 2000 year old sript in four different describtions

Bout the list my one will include most of what's already here then sum additions like

Martin Scorsese(The Goodfellas, Gangz of New York)
Woody Allen (The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Antz)
Steven Soderbergh(Ocean's Series)
Paul Anderson (Resident Evil Series)

i love me my

Steven spielberg
peter jackson
quentin tarantino
tyler perry

na by force to admire Nigerian filmmakers???

Jerry Bruckheimer
Quentin Tarantino. . .
The Coen Brothers. ,
and of course, Martin Scorsese.

~Ditto on justkunmi's list~


~Great choice you got there

@ hahaha,

if we don't admire Nollywood directors, what do you want us to do now?

(also, i'm interested in knowing why you think Amazing Grace was "a step in the right direction"

for me, i actually did want to list some Nollywood moviemakers, but if i'm honest, i'll have to admit that i have never seen a single Nollywood movie that i liked from beginning to end.

there have been a few i've seen that started out pretty good and had solid concepts, but they always end up losing focus and cohesion at some point. this point is in Part 2.

while i understand the economic incentive for stretching all movies into two parts, artistically it is a disaster because it compromises any integrity the story had to begin with.

you'll have a story that begins with a great idea, good characters and solid pacing--then, in order to extend it to 2 parts, the suspense is watered down with endless repetition, pointless scenes, extraneous subplots, long stretches of nothing happening. it's hard to have admiration for any filmmaker's work under those circumstances.

all that being said, the Nollywood filmmakers who i appreciate for what they manage to achieve under the circumstances, or at least for what they intend to do:

Lancelot O. Imasun - probably the first Nollywood director i noticed had a distinct sense of style. he makes a lot of movies, though, and i'd say maybe 1 out of 4 of them are good. especially when he works with--

Emem Isong - not a director, but as a writer-producer, all of her movies bear a distinct stamp. she knows how to set up a dramatic conflict, creates very sympathetic, 3-dimensional characters (a major rarity in Nollywoood), has excellent storytelling rhythm. the only thing that hurts a lot of her stories is the multi-part business.

Tchidi Chikere - like Isong, he comes from a solid dramatic background and creates engaging emotional conflicts and rich characters. as a director (working with his regular DOP, the great John Osameka), he has good visual panache. (the tautness of his stories is often diffused by the multi-part thing, of course)

the late Ebereonwu - probably one of the most interesting Nollywood auteurs before his very premature death. he also comes from a strong dramatic background, having previously authored short stories, novels and plays. he expressed some challenging intellectual views about his work and Nollywood in general in his interviews.

often, he would talk about his love deep study of Aristotle's Poetics and it was evident in his work that he had an advanced understanding of Aristotle's tenet that every story must have a beginning, middle and end--though not necessarily in that order.  just check out his movie "Discord," in which he twists the sequence of events in the narrative upon itself multiple times, revealing a little more information each time. it's probably the most intelligent Nollywood thriller i've ever seen.

predictably, though, it falls apart in Part 2.

hmmmm--i notice that apart from Lancelot, all the filmmakers i listed are primarily writers, and good ones, too!  that's why i keep telling all the people who complain that the problem with Nollywood is scripts--there are many good scripts in Nollywood; it's just that there are other circumstances that prevent them from being done justice.

 QT
John Woo
Martin Scorsese
Tyler Perry
Steven Spielberg


Naija

Tade Ogidan
Tunde Kelani
Simisola Opepluwa

Thanks so much for the correction.  He was the "Bond" novelist!  So a revise ma post!


Now, that's berrrrrrrer!

D-reloaded--

i actually haven't seen either one of those. the only Tunde Kelani movies i've watched are Magun, Abeni, and um--Campus Queen.

if you'd asked me seven years ago which Nigerian filmmakers i admired, Tunde Kelani would be the ONLY name i mentioned. and i still admire him, but i left his name off because--well, i don't know. his stories are good, and i like that he does Yoruba language stories, because it's so much better acted than the English stuff.

but ultimately, i don't think his movies stand out enough to really, really get me excited. back in the day, i admired him chiefly because of his cinematographical skills. at a time when most Nigerian movies looked like they were shot by people with impaired vision, he was really taking time to set up shots, light intelligently, coordinate colors, etc.

these days, though, i feel like a lot of the industry has caught up with him in that regard.

i still think he's great, mind you--but he just don't do it for me like that.

i'll check 'em out!

Tade Ogidan. The only Nigerian movies I can ever watch must be made by him. All the rest are not too sensible for my liking.

Chico Ejiro. Could have made sense too, but