Directors Who Went Out On Top

[mattorama12]

I'm a big fan of Tarantino generally, but was pretty disappointed by his latest outing, The Hateful Eight. I think he's been so successful that he does not have anybody to reign him in, and his films are becoming a little too indulgent. (Maybe it's too early to call that, since his second to last feature, Inglorious Basterds was undoubtedly one of his strongest efforts.) It reminded me of another one of the great working directors today, P.T. Anderson. Like The Hateful Eight, PTA's Inherent Vice seemed to to be the work of a great mind that wasn't properly reeled in. It got me thinking about successful directors in general, and how they seem to go too far in whatever direction it was that made them great in the first place (Cameron or Lucas with effects, Speilberg with melodrama, etc.)

So, the question I present it, what great directors went out on top? That is, they built a body of great work and continued to make strong films at the end of their career? The first that comes to mind is Kubrick. Eyes Wide Shut is somewhat polarizing, but I personally love it. Lumet is another potential candidate. Though I haven't seen much of his later work, I thought his final film, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead was fantastic. What other directors avoided jumping the shark and went out on a Seinfeld-esque high?

[edkrak]

Luis Bunuel made some of his best pictures at the end of career.

[Pickpocket]

Krzysztof Kieslowski and Sergio Leone were the first to come to mind

That is, they built a body of great work and continued to make strong films at the end of their career? The first that comes to mind is Kubrick. Eyes Wide Shut is somewhat polarizing, but I personally love it.

I think this is a good example of a director not going out on top. To go from The Shining to Eyes Wide Shut is a regression by anyone's standards I would think

[VinegarBob]

While I really liked Eyes Wide Shut I would class it as one of Kubrick's weaker films.

Off the top of my head three directors come to mind that went out on a high, although Charles Laughton's first film Night of The Hunter is a cracker. It was so poorly received at the time though that he never made another, so I guess that qualifies.

Andrei Tarkovsky's last film The Sacrifice is in my opinion one of his best - and that's saying something.
Ingmar Bergman's final theatrically released film Saraband is excellent.
Satyajit Ray's The Stranger ended his career with a very strong outing too.


I'm sure there's a bunch more, but it does seem that, as a general rule, a director's work tends to follow a bell curve in terms of quality.

[Bojangles]

Mike Nichols? Charlie Wilson's War ain't a bad encore.

There's a video somewhere on the internet where Tarantino talks about how Howard Hawks' oeuvre always kept Quentin's dick hard because there are so few misses from top to bottom. Looks like the third act of his career was pretty mediocre though...

[Stewball]

I think Barry Lyndon and The Shining were Kubrick's mid-career weaker efforts. The Shining, after all is nothing but a glorified horror movie devoid of any real substance. Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut were a return to greatness, with the latter being one of the most misunderstood movies of all time. I can only wish he'd lived to do AI instead of Spielberg.

There are a lot of others I'd like to name, but they're still working so I don't jinx 'em. I guess Tarantino could use a jinx, of sorts, but I think Pulp Fiction is still his best, though Inglorious Basterds comes close. If he's gonna go out big he's gotta come up with another one of that caliber. And it'd be nice if he'd put a lid on his idiotic personal rants if he doesn't want to be thought of as the D.W. Griffith of his time.

[ShogunRua]

Lumet is another potential candidate. Though I haven't seen much of his later work, I thought his final film, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead was fantastic.

Easily the best example. He made Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) exactly 50 years after 12 Angry Men, at the age of 83. Great, great movie. The movie right before that, Find Me Guilty (2006), was excellent, too. There's a lot to be said for getting a strong acting performance by Vin Diesel in a typically character-driven, dialogue-intense Lumet feature.

I haven't seen enough of his earlier works (although Les Bonnes Femmes (1960) is an all-time favorite), but Claude Chabrol's last film, Inspector Bellamy (2009) was quite good.

[mattorama12]

Re: Eyes Wide Shut, maybe not the best example because it's not going out "on top", but maybe it was just a bad title choice. I'm mostly just curious about directors who continued to produce quality films, even if it wasn't necessarily their own best work.

Sergio Leone looks like a good example. Looking at his filmography, I'm actually really surprised at how few films he made. I would have thought he was more prolific. I guess just because when I think of Western directors, I think of John Ford who made something like 672 films I believe.

The movie right before that, Find Me Guilty (2006), was excellent, too. There's a lot to be said for getting a strong acting performance by Vin Diesel in a typically character-driven, dialogue-intense Lumet feature.

I wasn't familiar with this movie and saw a bit of it randomly on tv a year or two ago. I was cracking up as soon as I saw Diesel, and then was quickly shocked at how competent he was. I only watched a couple minutes, but this is one I'll have to go check out. I've seen woefully few Lumet movies, but they've all been great with the exception of The Wiz.

I'm sure there's a bunch more, but it does seem that, as a general rule, a director's work tends to follow a bell curve in terms of quality.

Isn't this sort of surprising? In a vaccuum, I'd have expected that directors would tend to get better over time and produce their better films later in their career. But experience just doesn't seem to bear that out and I wonder why.

[CosmicMonkey]

The first director that came to mind for me was John Huston. His last two films were not just masterpieces but two of his best. Kubrick is not an example of that I think, his last great film in my opinion was Barry Lyndon, which each film he made afterwards being a noticeable downwards drop in quality from the last. Certainly, none of the were bad, but he ended his career on a mediocre note.

[VinegarBob]

I'm sure there's a bunch more, but it does seem that, as a general rule, a director's work tends to follow a bell curve in terms of quality.

Isn't this sort of surprising? In a vaccuum, I'd have expected that directors would tend to get better over time and produce their better films later in their career. But experience just doesn't seem to bear that out and I wonder why.

It seems kind of natural to me. I see what you mean from a technical point of view, but my theory is that people only have so much good material in them, or only so much to say about things, until they start to repeat themselves, get lazy, start to pander, succumb to commercial considerations over artistic ones etc. etc. There's a million reasons for a directors career to end on a bad film, and far fewer to end on a high note. I suppose it depends on the person, and why they're directing: because they have something to say or are just working for a paycheck. A lot of directors start off as the former and end up as the latter.