Directors Through Netflix

[rain Bard]

If it makes you feel any different, Oscar Guy, know that I could barely sit through an American in Paris or Gigi (though I'd like to try them out on the big screen someday), but I love Meet Me In St. Louis and the Band Wagon wholeheartedly.

[FilmFan720]

For what it's worth, my top 10 (in alphabetic order)

Woody Allen
Robert Altman
John Ford
Werner Herzog
Alfred Hitchcock
Sam Peckinpah
Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
Francois Truffaut
Orson Welles
Billy Wilder

[OscarGuy]

I prefer Gigi to An American in Paris but both are incredibly slight pictures. An American in Paris dwelled way too long on many of the dance numbers, dragging them beyond what was tolerable. They feel just as important to the plot as the montages in The Great Ziegfeld. Though beautiful to look at, completely unnecessary. I don't want to watch one dance sequence that lasts 20 minutes. That just seems too long to me.

If he's ranked high enough, I'll probably check some of them out, but I won't necessarily be in a rush to see them.

Hitchcock, I really don't have that many more to see as I've caught some of his most important works in the past.

[Big Magilla]

Since I don't care much for either Gigi or An American in Paris, I don't think I'll be able to sit through another Vincente Minnelli film.

Heresy!

I can understand someone finding An American in Paris and Gigi unworthy of their best picture Oscar wins, but a chore to sit through? Nah, though I think the former could have done with a little less ballet, and the latter plays best on a large screen.

Some major Minnelli is not yet avaliable on DVD and therefore not available from Netflix - The Pirate, Tea and Sympathy and Some Came Running among them, and Madame Bovary isn't released until next month, but in the meantime there's still Meet Me in St. Louis, The Clock (out tomorrow), The Bad and the Beautiful, The Band Wagon, Lust for Life and Home From the Hill, all of them providing major pleasures.

[Damien]

Since I don't care much for either Gigi or An American in Paris, I don't think I'll be able to sit through another Vincente Minnelli film.

If you consider yourself a serious film person, you simplly can't just ignore Vincente Minnelli. Gigi and American In Paris are slightly lugubrious for musicals (which is part of what I love about them), but as BJ suggests, check out The Band Wagon and Meet Me In St. Louis -- I can't imagine anyone not loving these two films. And try some of his melodramas, such as The Cobweb, Some Came Running and Home From The Hill. When I compiled a list of my favorite 250 films, Minnelli had more entries than any other director, even Ford.

[The Original BJ]

Since I don't care much for either Gigi or An American in Paris, I don't think I'll be able to sit through another Vincente Minnelli film.

Oh no! I LOVE Minnelli! You should absolutely give a chance to such greats as The Band Wagon, Meet Me in St. Louis, The Pirate, Madame Bovary, and Father of the Bride!

[OscarGuy]

Since I don't care much for either Gigi or An American in Paris, I don't think I'll be able to sit through another Vincente Minnelli film.

[Precious Doll]

1. Nicolas Roeg
2. Ken Russell
3. Douglas Sirk
4. Yasujiro Ozu
5. Michelangelo Antionioni
6. Alain Resnais
7. David Lynch
8. Robert Bresson
9. Eric Rohmer
10. Pedro Almodovar

[rain Bard]

This is not a scientific or definitive list, but here are ten directors who have a good portion of their work available on DVD (don't know about netflix as I'm not a subscriber), that I consider among my favorites and would definitely recommend a nice delve into the filmography of:

Preston Sturges
Werner Herzog
Robert Altman
Akira Kurosawa (I actually prefer other Japanese filmmakers but very few have a good representation on Region 1 DVD)
Carl Dreyer
Ernst Lubitsch
Buster Keaton
David Cronenberg
Orson Welles
Alfred Hitchcock

[Damien]

My Top 10:

1. John Ford
2. Jean Renoir
3. Leo McCarey
4. Blake Edwards
5. Yasujiro Ozu
6. Vincente Minnelli
7. Douglas Sirk
8. Roberto Rossellini
9. Max Ophuls
10. Jean-Luc Godard

(Honorable Mention to Abbas Kiarostami. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ernst Lubitsch, Robert Bresson, Orson Welles, Frank Tashlin, Nicholas Ray, Frank Borzage, Anthony Mann, Sam Fuller.)

[Penelope]

In addition to the ones Magilla cites, some of my favorites include:

Douglas Sirk
Anthony Mann
Mark Robson
Fred Zinnemann
Robert Aldrich
Mervyn LeRoy
Howard Hawks

[Big Magilla]

FYI, Killer's Kiss is available on Netflix.

[Big Magilla]

This is a daunting task. Even those of us who've seen a lot of films probably haven't seen everything by our favorite directors. If you're relying on Netflix, you aren't going to be able to find all the films of a given director unless the director is one of relatively recent low output. Anyway, since you asked, I would start with these:

5 from Hollywood's Golden Age:

John Ford
Alfred Hitchcock
George Cukor
Vincente Minnelli
Leo McCarey

5 from World Cinema:
Michael Powell
Jean Renoir
Federico Fellini
Luis Bunuel
Yasujiro Ozu

[OscarGuy]

OG, you are aware that those aren't Kubrick's three earliest films, right? Killer's Kiss is available on DVD, and with a little searching I'm sure Fear and Desire is available too.

Yes, I am aware but those films are not on Netflix, so I have no way to really get a hold of them.

[Johnny Guitar]

OG, you are aware that those aren't Kubrick's three earliest films, right? Killer's Kiss is available on DVD, and with a little searching I'm sure Fear and Desire is available too.