Great Directors and Their Best Decades

Francis Ford Coppola:

The 60's: A learning period. Not enough to really argue passionately about.

The 70's: "The Godfather", "The Conversation", "The Godfather Part 2" and "Apocalypse Now" all in a row. Arguably the greatest run of any filmmaker, period.

The Early 80's: Brave experiments noble, 'swing for the fences' failures. "One From The Heart", "The Outsiders", "Rumble Fish", "The Cotton Club". Unique stories or routine stories told in a unique way.

The Late 80's: Financial failures of early 80's starts to cause panic. Starts overthinking, trying to guess what the audience wants while still working in his own touches. "Tucker", "Gardens of Stone", "Peggy Sue Got Married".  "The Godfather III" would fall into this period, too, even though it was released in '90.

The 90's: Deeper panic. Starts trying to guess what the audience wants and gives up even trying to put anything personal in. "Dracula" (pretty, but empty), "Jack", "The Rainmaker".

The 2000's: Seems to have made peace. Goes back to the beginning, doing exactly what he wants, seemingly not caring at all about the response. "Youth Without Youth", "Tetro", "Twixt". I don't like either of the first two (haven't seen "Twixt"), but I respect the hell out of the fact that he's working his way, again. Hopefully, he still has more greatness to show.

Ridley Scott:

The 70s: Coming from a TV commercial background, Scott breaks through with his brilliantly majestic $900,00 feature debut film The Duellists in 1977. Two years later, he skyrockets to the Hollywood A-List with the seminal, gargantuan blockbuster, Alien.

The 80s: Capitalizing on his new found clout, Scott makes Blade Runner, a troubled, massive budget production that bombs in the Summer of '82. With the remainder of his Alien clout, he drafts new star Tom Cruise for the uber-expensive 1985 fantasy Legend, which also bombs. Now relegated to less risky projects, the visualist director takes on the decidedly lower budget Tom Berenger thriller Someone To Watch Over Me, which flops in 1987. Finally in 1989, Scott has his first quantifiable hit in 10 years with the Michael Douglas crime actioner Black Rain, which keeps him in the A-List "hired gun" category at the turn of the decade.

The 90s: In 1991, Scott hits it big with the outta-the-blue critical & box office hit, Thelma & Louise, and coupled with an intensifying re-appreciation of his flop Blade Runner born from the release of his BR: Director's Cut in 1992, Scott finds himself in demand as Hollywood's premiere cinematic visualist. Unfortunately, his return to mega-budget productions lands with a hard thud with the bloated Gerard Depardieu epic 1492: Conquest of Paradise, which bombs in the Fall of '92. Seemingly rudderless (heh), Scott fills out his 90s oeuvre with the underwhelming double whammy of White Squall in 1996 & G.I. Jane in 1997. The 90s, it seems, belongs to Tony.

The 00s: His career now held aloft by the fact that he directed Blade Runner, now recognized as an uber-classic of the medium, Scott finally makes good on his rep with the massively successful Oscar-sweeper Gladiator. A film that was made up mostly on the spot, having only 30 pages of script when shooting began. 2001's masterful actioner Black Hawk Down & flawed Silence Of The Lambs sequel Hannibal cement Scott as one of Hollywood's biggest A-List daddies. He follows through with this new found license & knocks out a film every year or so, each with wildly divergent returns. 2003's Nicolas Cage comedy-caper Matchstick Men disappoints, as does 2005's mega-budget historical epic Kingdom Of Heaven (which has garnered positive reappraisal in recent years due to it's "Director's Cut"). In 2006, Scott fails out of the gate with the Russell Crowe wank-a-thon A Good Year ("The story of a man who has everything..and learns..that he deserves even more"). He finds his critical & box office feet again with 2007's morally ambiguous yet awesome American Gangster & follows it up with 2008's inexplicably pointless spy-thriller flop Body Of Lies starring Leo DiCaprio & Russell Crowe.

The 10s: In 2010, Scott & Crowe prove that the Gladiator lightning bolt does not strike twice with Robin Hood, a silly, hollow exercise in mythological blueballs. Despite what seems like a wealth of beautifully filmed/designed bombs, Scott has a permanent "free pass" due to his handful of inarguable classics & in 2011, the world awaits Scott's return to the Alien universe with 2012's Prometheus.

John Carpenter

Each decade in his career has been a little different, but I'd have to say he was on a serious tear in the '80s.

1970s - Carpenter's funny, entertaining student film Dark Star gets him enough attention to make the phenomenally tense retelling of Zulu set at a police station, Assault on Precinct 13.  Carpenter gets hired to bring to life a couple of ideas producers had for a potentially lucrative little horror movie, babysitter murders on Halloween, and creates a masterpiece of tension and atmosphere, virtually creating the sub-genre of the "slasher movie," which will never duplicate the awesomeness of the original.  He follows it up with a couple of TV movies, including the '79 biopic Elvis, thus beginning his collaboration with Kurt Russell.

1980s - Fueled by the success of Halloween, Carpenter is on fire throughout the '80s.  He makes the Northern California ghost story The Fog (with the great Tom Atkins), then the super-fun futuristic Escape From New York, in which Russell creates Snake Plisskin, then continues working with Russell and his behind-the-scenes collaborators on his masterpiece The Thing (and because it was 1982, the year of E.T., The Thing is reviled by critics and bombs at the box office).  He then directs the underrated Christine (one of the most quotable movies of all time and a personal favorite of mine), which was not well received at the time but has since grown a cult following, then accepts a director-for-hire assignment that will result in the beautiful, romantic scifi drama Starman--which gets enough attention for Jeff Bridges to get an Oscar nomination.  Getting his mojo back somewhat, Carpenter reunites with Russell for Big Trouble in Little China (his last movie with longtime collaborator, cinematographer Dean Cundey), then makes the brainy, fun and awesome Prince of Darkness and the prescient They Live with Rowdy Roddy Piper.  Every one of these flicks is a home run in its own way.   

1990s - In 1992, Carpenter makes his only misfire, in my opinion, Memoirs of an Invisible Man--too much of a big budget studio joint, with a demanding star, to be a true Carpenter Movie.  Next comes the TV series Body Bags, which is OK, and the fantastic Lovecraftian In the Mouth of Madness.  In 1995, he remakes Village of the Damned with Christopher Reeve, then reunites with Russell and Debra Hill to revisit Snake Plisskin, this time in Escape From L.A., which is a fun, campy version of the superior Escape From New York.  He follows this with John Carpenter's Vampires with James Woods, a balls-out vampire western that does not get the recognition it deserves.  But it's worth noting that finally, after its initial rejection, The Thing begins to show up on all-time top-ten lists, with particular attention paid not only to Carpenter's masterful direction but the incredible practical effects work by mad genius Rob Bottin. 

2000s - Carpenter's lost decade.  I loved Ghosts of Mars - yet another return to the Zulu structure of a small group of people banding together to fight hoards of bad guys, in this case, Martian ghosts inhabiting the bodies of colonists.  With its flashbacks within flashbacks, Ghosts of Mars was panned, unfairly.  I loved it.  He followed that with two episodes of the Masters of Horror TV series (both written by the Carpenter fans Drew McWeeny and Scott Swan), then nothing, then 2010's The Ward, which is a fine little ghost story/psychological thriller but not a proper Carpenter movie.

2011s - Hoping for a true return to form from an underrated filmmaking master.

At the risk of being pedantic, how come everyone's counting 2010 as part of the 00's? It was the start of the current decade, unless you consider the year 2000 to be part of the 90's.

Hope you didn't break any monocles writing that.

For me, I can see breaking up film eras by specific decades, but as for an individual's best period, it makes more sense to just look at any great stretch, no matter what year it started.  Scorsese from Mean Streets to The King of Comedy falls within two decades on the calendar, but it's basically a single decade of mastery.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Art Decade 

Hope you didn't break any monocles writing that.

I must confess I was half hoping someone was subscribing to that wrong headed idea that "actually the new decade started with 2011!" that I kept seeing people come out with last new years - I was all good and ready to put people in their place with my watertight rebuttal! Sadly it looks like it was just an oversight, so I guess I'll have to get my snarky little kicks elsewhere.

Actually I don't really mind people grouping the 00's and the 10's together for the sake of discussions like these, cos it's too early for us to really distinguish them at this point.

So er, just ignore me and carry on, I guess.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paul C 

At the risk of being pedantic, how come everyone's counting 2010 as part of the 00's? It was the start of the current decade, unless you consider the year 2000 to be part of the 90's.

Guilty.  :(

This and the other thread remind me that certain years were incredible for movies. 

1982 was particularly powerful for all the great genre movies released that year, with The Thing, E.T., Poltergeist, Blade Runner, Tron. 

1976 was also an amazing year, with Taxi Driver, Carrie, Network, All The Presidents Men, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Rocky, Marathon Man, The Omen, etc. 

1977 had Annie Halll, Star Wars, Close Encounters, etc.

1956 had Godzilla, Moby Dick, The Searchers, Forbidden Planet, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Giant, The Wrong Man.

1931 had Dracula, Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, City Lights, The Public Enemy and M. 

That's insane about 1956, I never put that one together. There was also The Killing,  Rififi, &  The Ten Commandments that year.

1999 was also a landmark year: Fight Club, The Matrix, Being John Malkovich, Eyes Wide Shut, Galaxy Quest, Office Space, The Limey, The Sixth Sense, & SW: Ep 1.

Yeah, 1956 was some kind of renaissance!  1999 has to be added to the list of great years.  It's hard to know when you're in them what a great year it was.