10 Most Important Directors Of The 21st Century (So Far)

11. Honourable Mentions And Dishonourable Excuses

Just as a brief explanation to wave away what you may consider to be glaring omissions, there are some names that don’t qualify to be listed here based on a fairly specific criteria.

For example: you might expect the likes of Steven Spielberg or Martin Scorsese to appear, but while they have made some breath-taking films over the last seventeen years, their names are inextricably linked with the 1970s and 1980s, where their contributions to the medium are more obvious and significant.

Similarly, this list is predominantly populated by white men, because that’s unfortunately who’s running Hollywood. While I’d love to include the likes of Steve McQueen, Barry Jenkins, Patty Jenkins, Kathryn Bigelow, Sophia Coppola and Ava DuVernay here, both for creating wonderful films and pushing social boundaries, their relatively short careers and small filmographies mean it’s hard to rank them alongside some of the other names present.

The same could be said for Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Paul Thomas Anderson, Wes Anderson, Tim Burton, Lars Von Trier, Jason Reitman, Lynne Ramsay, Pedro Almodovar, and a whole host of others too numerous to name, all of whom could be considered ‘better’ directors than those listed, but who haven’t quite left the same hefty cultural footprint in their wake.

As the industry grows and evolves, the aforementioned names will no doubt appear on such lists in four or five years time.