10 Terrible Films By Game Of Thrones Directors
They shouldn't have left Westeros.
HBO's Game of Thrones has gone from strength to strength since the first season took primetime television by storm back in 2011, with the finale of the show's latest run bringing in a series-record 8.9 million viewers. It's already deeply ingrained in pop culture and will undoubtedly define the current generation of television, and this is testament not only to a talented author in George R. R. Martin, but to those who adapted his work for the screen.
David Benioff and D. B. Weiss have come in for some criticism from certain sections of the A Song Of Ice And Fire crowd, though their commitment to realising Martin's epic has not gone unnoticed at the Emmys. The showrunning duo are the current holders of the award for Outstanding Drama Series, and they weren't the only Game Of Thrones winners at the last ceremony.
Another reigning Emmy champion is director David Nutter, who triumphed in the Outstanding Direction for a Drama Series category with his season 5 finale Mother's Mercy. Two of his fellow Game Of Thrones directors are in contention to take the winged statue away from him this year - Jack Bender for his tear-jerking episode The Door, and Miguel Sapochnik for the epic Battle Of The Bastards.
It stands to reason that a show of Game of Thrones' magnitude should employ the best in the industry, and when it comes to directors that is clearly the case. The small-screen credentials of the show's many helmers speak for themselves, though a good television director doesn't always make a good feature film director, as the following examples prove beyond doubt.
10. Repo Men (2004)
42555Director: Miguel Sapochnik
Miguel Sapochnik has directed some of the most memorable Game Of Thrones episodes to date, making his debut during the show's fifth season with The Gift and then the critically acclaimed Hardhome. The English director returned for Season 6 and was entrusted with the final two episodes - the highly anticipated and well-received Battle Of The Bastards and The Winds Of Winter.
Sapochnik has also worked on House and True Detective in the past, earning a name for himself as a talent in the world of direction. In TV at least; his one and only attempt at a feature film thus far wasn't met with the same level of approval. Far from it in fact - Repo Men scored a measly 22% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Based on the novel The Repossession Mambo by Eric Garcia, this sci-fi action-thriller stars Jude Law and Forest Whitaker and takes place in a near future where diseased organs can be replaced with bio-mechanical ones. If patients fall behind on payments, however, the Repo Men are called in to reclaim the replacement organs in ruthless and violent fashion.
It's a gory premise, and Sapochnik certainly can't be accused of shying away from the job at hand, though the amount of blood and guts simply becomes mind numbing after a while and completely loses impact by the end. An excess of homages and a twist right out of the left field are just failed attempts at saving a movie that manages to be ultra-violent and ultra-dull at the same time.