Top 600 Directors
The directors below are ranked based on how the quality of films that they directed, including films not on the master list. Directors get credit only on films for which they were credited unless no director was credited for the film. In this situation, the director identified by the Internet Movie Database is treated as a credited director for the film. If more than one director is credited for a film, points for the film are divided evenly among the listed directors.
- Steven Spielberg
- Alfred Hitchcock
- Stanley Kubrick
- Martin Scorsese
- Billy Wilder
- Francis Ford Coppola
- Akira Kurosawa
- Christopher Nolan
- Ridley Scott
- James Cameron
- Quentin Tarantino
- John Ford
- Howard Hawks
- Charles Chaplin
- Peter Jackson
- Ingmar Bergman
- Woody Allen
- Hayao Miyazaki
- David Lean
- Joel Coen
- Orson Welles
- Roman Polanski
- Robert Zemeckis
- Rob Reiner
- John Huston
- Fritz Lang
- David Lynch
- Sergio Leone
- David Fincher
- Clint Eastwood
- Michael Curtiz
- Victor Fleming
- Frank Capra
- William Wyler
- John Carpenter
- Sidney Lumet
- Federico Fellini
- Jean-Luc Godard
- George Lucas
- Tim Burton
- Luis Buñuel
- Brian De Palma
- George Cukor
- Robert Altman
- François Truffaut
- Robert Wise
- Ang Lee
- David Cronenberg
- Richard Linklater
- Andrei Tarkovsky
- Elia Kazan
- Spike Lee
- Paul Thomas Anderson
- Milos Forman
- Terry Gilliam
- William Friedkin
- Jonathan Demme
- Alfonso Cuarón
- Ernst Lubitsch
- F. W. Murnau
- Jean Renoir
- Krzysztof Kieslowski
- Yasujirô Ozu
- Sam Raimi
- Wes Anderson
- Mike Nichols
- Brad Bird
- Werner Herzog
- Vincente Minnelli
- Kar-Wai Wong
- John Lasseter
- Sam Peckinpah
- Pete Docter
- Guillermo del Toro
- Paul Verhoeven
- Peter Weir
- James Whale
- Frank Darabont
- Andrew Stanton
- Terrence Malick
- Danny Boyle
- Richard Donner
- Michael Mann
- Carol Reed
- George Miller
- Michael Powell
- George A. Romero
- John Landis
- Joseph L. Mankiewicz
- Stanley Donen
- Satyajit Ray
- John McTiernan
- Pedro Almodóvar
- Kathryn Bigelow
- Carl Theodor Dreyer
- Leo McCarey
- Vittorio De Sica
- Michelangelo Antonioni
- Robert Bresson
- Fred Zinnemann
- Mel Brooks
- Nicholas Ray
- Oliver Stone
- Robert Aldrich
- Darren Aronofsky
- Bong Joon Ho
- Wim Wenders
- Bryan Singer
- George Roy Hill
- Denis Villeneuve
- Irvin Kershner
- Don Siegel
- Edgar Wright
- John Sturges
- Wes Craven
- Preston Sturges
- Otto Preminger
- Nicolas Roeg
- George Stevens
- Alain Resnais
- Park Chan-wook
- Sergei M. Eisenstein
- Gus Van Sant
- Luchino Visconti
- Harold Ramis
- Arthur Penn
- Ron Howard
- Steven Soderbergh
- Lars von Trier
- Kenji Mizoguchi
- Chris Columbus
- David Hand
- Franklin J. Schaffner
- Norman Jewison
- Michael Apted
- Jean-Pierre Melville
- Sam Mendes
- Bernardo Bertolucci
- John Hughes
- Michael Haneke
- Rainer Werner Fassbinder
- John Frankenheimer
- Buster Keaton
- John G. Avildsen
- Roberto Rossellini
- David Yates
- Sydney Pollack
- Henri-Georges Clouzot
- D. W. Griffith
- Hal Ashby
- Jacques Tourneur
- Michel Gondry
- John Cassavetes
- Blake Edwards
- Jim Jarmusch
- Emeric Pressburger
- Wolfgang Petersen
- Jean-Pierre Jeunet
- Lee Unkrich
- M. Night Shyamalan
- Terry Jones
- Sofia Coppola
- Abbas Kiarostami
- Tobe Hooper
- Charles Laughton
- Agnès Varda
- Cameron Crowe
- John Woo
- Michael Cimino
- Alan J. Pakula
- Jacques Tati
- Yimou Zhang
- Alexander Mackendrick
- Louis Malle
- Dario Argento
- Spike Jonze
- Raoul Walsh
- Luc Besson
- Gene Kelly
- Paul Greengrass
- Anthony Mann
- Tod Browning
- Fernando Meirelles
- Amy Heckerling
- Mike Leigh
- Peter Bogdanovich
- Jean Cocteau
- (tie) Lana Wachowski
and
Lilly Wachowski
- William A. Wellman
- Henry Selick
- Philip Kaufman
- Jane Campion
- James Mangold
- Samuel Fuller
- Mel Gibson
- Bob Fosse
- Richard Lester
- Gore Verbinski
- Curtis Hanson
- Isao Takahata
- Max Ophüls
- J.J. Abrams
- King Vidor
- Robert Mulligan
- Barry Levinson
- Mervyn LeRoy
- Jordan Peele
- Mike Newell
- Alexander Payne
- John Schlesinger
- Steve McQueen
- Robert Stevenson
- John Boorman
- Ivan Reitman
- Alejandro G. Iñárritu
- Ryan Coogler
- Tony Scott
- Josef von Sternberg
- Masaki Kobayashi
- Marcel Carné
- Todd Haynes
- Stephen Frears
- Penny Marshall
- Lewis Milestone
- Joss Whedon
- Barry Jenkins
- Jacques Demy
- Jon Favreau
- Claire Denis
- Douglas Sirk
- James Gunn
- Baz Luhrmann
- Damien Chazelle
- John Waters
- Chantal Akerman
- Ethan Coen
- Rian Johnson
- Richard Kelly
- Stanley Kramer
- Doug Liman
- Pier Paolo Pasolini
- Alan Parker
- Jules Dassin
- Guy Ritchie
- Zack Snyder
- Chris Marker
- Sam Wood
- Gillo Pontecorvo
- Edward Yang
- David O. Russell
- Robert Wiene
- Éric Rohmer
- Edward Zwick
- Greta Gerwig
- Guy Hamilton
- Ben Sharpsteen
- Andrzej Wajda
- Errol Morris
- Hamilton Luske
- Katsuhiro Ôtomo
- Henry King
- Martin Campbell
- Adam McKay
- Cecil B. DeMille
- Terence Young
- Robert Rodriguez
- Kevin Smith
- Takashi Miike
- Peter Yates
- Richard Brooks
- James Wan
- (tie) Ron Clements and
John Musker
- Richard Marquand
- (tie) Anthony Russo and
Joe Russo
- Wolfgang Reitherman
- Garry Marshall
- Georges Méliès
- Hirokazu Koreeda
- Steve James
- Richard Fleischer
- Michael Bay
- Jean Vigo
- James L. Brooks
- Martin Ritt
- Rouben Mamoulian
- Giuseppe Tornatore
- Tomas Alfredson
- Terence Fisher
- Dziga Vertov
- Ron Shelton
- Jacques Rivette
- James Ivory
- Joe Johnston
- Matthew Vaughn
- Céline Sciamma
- Nicholas Meyer
- John Sayles
- Robert Rossen
- Joe Wright
- Nora Ephron
- Mario Bava
- Mark Sandrich
- Robert Hamer
- Ernest B. Schoedsack
- Lasse Hallström
- Luca Guadagnino
- Walter Hill
- Leni Riefenstahl
- Clyde Geronimi
- Stuart Rosenberg
- Michael Moore
- David Zucker
- Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
- Neil Jordan
- Anthony Minghella
- Todd Phillips
- Elem Klimov
- Claude Lanzmann
- Kevin Costner
- Taika Waititi
- Béla Tarr
- Joel Schumacher
- Martin Brest
- W.S. Van Dyke
- Dennis Hopper
- Roger Corman
- Victor Erice
- Erich von Stroheim
- Alejandro Amenábar
- Roberto Benigni
- Ken Loach
- Dean DeBlois
- Robin Hardy
- Satoshi Kon
- Adrian Lyne
- Merian C. Cooper
- Nicolas Winding Refn
- Randal Kleiser
- Tom Hooper
- Jonathan Glazer
- Hsiao-hsien Hou
- Ari Aster
- Martin McDonagh
- Jim Sharman
- Alex Proyas
- Jason Reitman
- Georges Franju
- Ousmane Sembene
- Alex Garland
- Roland Emmerich
- Jerry Zucker
- Barry Sonnenfeld
- Trey Parker
- Peter Farrelly
- Thomas Vinterberg
- Frederick Wiseman
- Frank Oz
- Rob Minkoff
- Ishirô Honda
- (tie) Gary Trousdale and
Kirk Wise
- Clyde Bruckman
- Gary Ross
- Neill Blomkamp
- Lawrence Kasdan
- Herbert Ross
- Richard Attenborough
- Jack Clayton
- Matt Reeves
- F. Gary Gray
- Mel Stuart
- Nagisa Ôshima
- Richard Curtis
- Charles Burnett
- Terry Zwigoff
- Charles Crichton
- Victor Sjöström
- Paul Feig
- Andrew Adamson
- Mark Waters
- Ken Russell
- Roger Allers
- Robert Eggers
- Joe Dante
- Lindsay Anderson
- Bob Clark
- Jay Roach
- Ari Folman
- Fred M. Wilcox
- Alejandro Jodorowsky
- Asghar Farhadi
- Jim Sheridan
- J. Lee Thompson
- Jacques Audiard
- Claude Chabrol
- Georg Wilhelm Pabst
- Patty Jenkins
- Kenneth Branagh
- Nick Cassavetes
- Penelope Spheeris
- Andrew Davis
- Emile Ardolino
- Judd Apatow
- Rob Marshall
- Robert J. Flaherty
- René Clair
- Phil Alden Robinson
- Henry Hathaway
- John Singleton
- George Sidney
- Tony Kaye
- David Anspaugh
- Ted Kotcheff
- Paul Schrader
- Duncan Jones
- Yorgos Lanthimos
- Mike Judge
- Mikheil Kalatozishvili
- Clarence Brown
- Lloyd Bacon
- Mary Harron
- Takeshi Kitano
- Mike Hodges
- Noah Baumbach
- Tony Richardson
- Jon Turteltaub
- James Marsh
- Bruce Robinson
- Phillip Noyce
- Carl Reiner
- Alex Cox
- Joseph Losey
- Jennie Livingston
- Don Bluth
- Ava DuVernay
- Lynne Ramsay
- Stephen Daldry
- Mira Nair
- Michael Ritchie
- John Cameron Mitchell
- Jan de Bont
- John Badham
- Abel Ferrara
- Jack Arnold
- Christopher Guest
- Peter Greenaway
- Mathieu Kassovitz
- Tsai Ming-liang
- Tom McCarthy
- Bill Forsyth
- Apichatpong Weerasethakul
- Robert Siodmak
- Gina Prince-Bythewood
- Ben Affleck
- Michael Lehmann
- Gavin O'Connor
- Francis Lawrence
- Jerome Robbins
- Greg Mottola
- Andrew Niccol
- Abel Gance
- Jon Watts
- Jim Henson
- Oliver Hirschbiegel
- Nick Park
- Kelly Reichardt
- Michael Winterbottom
- Christopher McQuarrie
- Theodoros Angelopoulos
- Nancy Meyers
- J.A. Bayona
- Ben Stiller
- Robert Redford
- Gaspar Noé
- Stephen Herek
- Kaige Chen
- D.A. Pennebaker
- Barbara Kopple
- Shane Meadows
- Sylvain Chomet
- Bennett Miller
- Budd Boetticher
- Edmund Goulding
- Hugh Hudson
- Patricio Guzmán
- James McTeigue
- William Dieterle
- Taylor Hackford
- Edward Dmytryk
- Arthur Hiller
- Wilfred Jackson
- Lewis Gilbert
- Gordon Parks
- Norman Z. McLeod
- Paul King
- Sylvester Stallone
- Tom Tykwer
- Gurinder Chadha
- Robert Clouse
- Charles Walters
- Jared Hess
- Mamoru Oshii
- Hideo Nakata
- Mikio Naruse
- Bob Rafelson
- Kinji Fukasaku
- Leon Gast
- Mark Robson
- Monte Hellman
- Jim Abrahams
- Marc Webb
- Hiroshi Teshigahara
- Peter Watkins
- Andrew Dominik
- John Carney
- Stephen Chow
- Larry Charles
- Marcel Ophüls
- Abdellatif Kechiche
- Chad Stahelski
- Makoto Shinkai
- Lukas Moodysson
- William Keighley
- Chuck Jones
- George Marshall
- Gil Junger
- Costa-Gavras
- Asif Kapadia
- Walter Lang
- Jennifer Kent
- Gareth Evans
- John Krasinski
- Robert Benton
- Peyton Reed
- Julian Schnabel
- Edgar G. Ulmer
- Debra Granik
- Emir Kusturica
- Edwin S. Porter
- Glauber Rocha
- Roland Joffé
- Michael Anderson
- Nuri Bilge Ceylan
- Chris Sanders
- George Seaton
- Aleksandr Sokurov
- Adam Shankman
- James Frawley
- Elaine May
- Neil Marshall
- Kon Ichikawa
- John McNaughton
- Henry Koster
- Shane Black
- Jacques Becker
- Jean-Marc Vallée
- Byron Haskin
- Sergio Corbucci
- Kim Ki-duk
- Sean Penn
- Kenneth Lonergan
- Rich Moore
- Leos Carax
- Tomm Moore
- Shôhei Imamura
- Joshua Oppenheimer
- Delmer Daves
- George P. Cosmatos
- Chris Noonan
- Godfrey Reggio
- Kaneto Shindô
- Lee Chang-dong
- P.J. Hogan
- Andrea Arnold
- Byron Howard
- Kevin Macdonald
- Kimberly Peirce
- Brian G. Hutton
- Laurence Olivier
- Charles Vidor
- Lisa Cholodenko
- Sharon Maguire
- Howard Deutch
- Stuart Gordon
- Roger Michell
- (tie) Daniel Myrick and
Eduardo Sánchez
- Maurice Pialat
- Jackie Chan
- Roy Ward Baker
- Jonathan Lynn
- Joseph Sargent
- Peter Berg
- Pawel Pawlikowski
- John Madden
- Terence Davies
- Kenneth Anger
This page was last modified on January 16, 2025
