Overrated Film Directors

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A simple Google search will reveal quite a few big names appearing in the top 10s of overrated directors, including the likes of Woody Allen, Ridley Scott, Michael Bay, Tarantino and even Martin Scorsese.

Some argue the reasons for this include one or two-hit wonders who live off that reputation such as George Lucas and Star Wars; or Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction from Tarantino.

Other critics believe some directors play it safe by keeping to the same formula such as Chris Nolan and his Memento and Inception. Or Scorsese and his Goodfellas, Casino, Gangs of New York and the Irishman.

If I’m being honest I don’t really care what these critics say, or even if they have a point or not. That said, if there was one director that really gets on my nerves and can never quite understand why he receives so many plaudits as one of the greatest directors EVER, and that would be Alfred Hitchcock!

Over the Christmas and New Year holiday period I decided to give this cunt a chance by watching 5 of his most highly praised films – Psycho, Rear Window, North by North West, Vertigo and The Birds.

It was a herculean effort getting through this lot, but I suppose the best of the bunch would have to be Psycho if only because it had some truly suspenseful moments and it didn’t star Hitchcock’s usual blandies in James Stewart and Cary Grant.

The other 4 films were adequate, but still doesn’t explain why film critics fall over themselves bigging all of them up as something really special and typically “Hitchcockian”

In my opinion he made some boring, bland, tedious, predictable shite. Give me Akira Kurosawa, any day of the week as he pisses all over him in the director stakes!

With this in mind who would you say was the most overrated director, past or present?

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Nominated by: Technocunt

150 thoughts on “Overrated Film Directors”

  1. Shane Meadows is crap. His Stone Roses film was shite. Just arselicked the band himself, filmed fanboys and dadrock caricatures outside the gig venues, and backed off and stopped filming when the band started fighting. As soon as Brown said ‘The drummer’s a cunt!’ Meadows cut everything and said he felt he should ‘back off’.

    What sort of director worth his salt does that? Meadows was a fanboy filming his favourite band, hardly a good idea. Brown said he didn’t want a trip down memory lane. But, because he hired Meadows, that’s what we got. More a Madchester nostalgia wank than a here and now warts and all reunion film.

    At least the Maysles brothers left the cameras rolling during the Altamont bloodbath, and Michael Lindsey Hogg put hidden mics about while the Beatles were arguing.

    • Yeah but it’s Shane ‘This Is England’ Meadows.

      He’s every Labour voter’s new favourite director.

      • That’s true Cuntamus.

        Brown was all over him, Squire wasn’t convinced and I don’t blame him.

        Talking of the Roses axeman, his new stuff with Liam Gallagher is pretty good.

      • I read that Mike Leigh, Labour voters’ old favourite (aside from Ken Loach) is having trouble finding anyone to fund his exciting drama.

  2. Sofia ‘Nepobaby’ Copolla. Absolute shiizer.

    Overhyped, overrated bollocks. That one with Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson? Staggeringly pretentious arse. And the one with Kirsten Dunce as Marie Antoinette? I’ve never laughed so much. It was like a Carry On film with a bif budget and a shit soundtrack. What a load of old crap.

  3. Speilberg gets a free pass for the mighty Jaws and Raiders of the Lost Ark. What entertaining night out at the pictures films should be.

    And also for his involvement in the Blues Brothers.

    Thought E.T was a load of schmaltzy bollocks, mind you.

  4. Love that film where the great Peter Cook is the Devil, Little Dud wants to shag Eleanor Bron, and Raquel Welch is in her red duds. Brilliant.

  5. Richard Lester fucked the Superman films.

    Richard Donner’s first Superman was epic. The best superhero film ever made. But Superman II was ruined by Lester’s slapstick shite. And Superman III was complete bollocks. A very bad vehicle for Richard Pryor at his most OTT. Nor even Pamela Stephenson’s tits could save it.

    • Christopher Reeve, Margot Kidder and Gene Hackman loathed the change from Donner to Lester. Reeve was diplomatic, but Hackman and Kidder were openly outspoken about how badly treated Donner was.

    • I think Superman 3 is one that really pissed off Reeve.

      It was clear the film had been rewritten around Pryor.

      The sequence with the computer and the sister of Vaughn’s character scared me as a kid. I’m fairly sure it was one of the first films I saw.

      • The woman getting sucked into the computer scared the beejezus out of me too.

        But as a kid the Superman where the three bearded space-slavs land on the moon and start killing astronauts I found so utterly chilling, probably because they were toying with their prey.

        At least I think they all had beards.

      • I loved Terence Stamp’s General Zod as a kid. The film is a mess though, Richard Donner replaced by Richard Lester halfway through, beef between Reeve and the big unit who played Non.(Jack O’Halloran). The Salkinds were cunts, but poor Reeve ended up working for even bigger cunts (Golan-Globus – calm down, Miles) for Supes 4:The Quest for a Budget.

  6. Peter Jackson.

    Very clever bloke, probably a nice bloke.

    His Beatles film was good. And it showed what a cunt Yoko Fucking Ono was.
    The bitch was gleefully screaming centre stage when George Harrison quit the Beatles and left. It was left out of the 1970 Let It Be film. But Jackson, to his credit, left it in.

    Lennon was also having a serious conversation with somebody and she kept screeching his name down a mic to get John’s attention. Fair play to Jackson to not caving in to the ‘Yoko was great and never caused a days trouble’ brigade.

    • No idea about any miserable tribute to the turds but he made fucking Bad Taste and Braindead so he deserves respect much.

  7. William Friedkin, great director and a notorious pussy hound. He ploughed some top quality tail.

    The French Connection, is it the best ever ‘cop’ movie?

    • Letting off rounds next to actors’ heads.

      Real director.

      Just don’t hand the gun to Alec Baldwin.

    • I collect films but there isn’t any director who I ‘follow’, I’ve learned from experience that a director who makes a really good film is just as likely to make a really shit one afterwards.
      I’ve got more films by Hisayasu Sato than anyone else but it isn’t because any of them stand out, with him you can always expect something different and usually very politically incorrect.

    • I forgot mad Sam Peckinpah; Wild Bunch, Straw Dogs, Pat Garrett & Billy…

      James Coburn and Warren Oates, two brilliant actors.

      No forgetting Convoy, er?

  8. Overrated film Directors that spring to mind are:

    – Zack Snyder (Too long, too visually pretentious and very self indulgent).
    – The Farrelly Brothers (Most of their films have not stood the test of time and are mostly just idiotic, whimsical cringe). Kingpin was good though.
    – Martin Scorsese (has made some good, if long, movies in the past but has disappeared up his own arse in recent years.)

  10. Guy Ritchie.
    Started off great with Lock Stock, and shortly afterwards, Snatch.

    But then went a bit arty-farty with some total bollocks, including “Swept Away” (starring Madge, his ex missus); Revolver and RocknRoller along with one or two other duds.

    Did okay with Sherlock Holmes, and The Covenant is supposed to be very good, although I haven’t seen it yet.

    And then there’s James Cameron. Amazing start to his film career with the Terminator films, Abyss, Aliens and True Lies. But now seems to be dining out on the Avatar franchise

  11. George Lucas

    Another one trick pony with the first three Star Wars films, which were mostly awesome. And then didn’t bother directing anything else until 1999 and the next SW trilogy, which were all wank!

    He is also known as an executive producer, whatever the fuck that means, bur involved the same 6 SW films and some of the Indiana Jones films.

    But he will always be associated for those first 3 SW films (we could throw in his earlier American Graffiti offering) and lives off that.

      • Lucas was indeed a one trick pony. He only directed the first Star Wars film. The Empire Strikes Back was directed by Irvin Kershner, and Return of the Jedi was directed by Richard Marquand.

      • David lynch was in the running to direct Jedi.

        Luckily he decided to adapt Dune.

        I quite like David Lynch but I dread to think what his version of ROTJ would end up like.

    • Peter Cushing and Alec Guinness were two of several who saved Star Wars, getting the British crew on side and Guinness urged Lucas to rewrite some of the clunkier lines.

      Another key figure was Gary Kurtz, who reined in some of Lucas’ daft ideas, as well as Marcia Lucas, who edited the film.

      We see what happens when Lucas doesn’t have senior figures to steer him and instead celebrate ‘George’s vision’. – he produces the crapfest of the early noughties.

      Besides Star Wars, Lucas directed American Graffiti, which is pretty good.

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