10 Directors Who Need To Get Back On The Big Screen

4. Shane Meadows

He is the man who discovered Paddy Considine, giving the actor a starring role in his 1997 film A Room For Romeo Brass, and for that alone, Shane Meadows deserves a knighthood. A gritty and realistic director of the ugly side of British culture, he somewhat unfortunately appears to have swapped the big screen for the small. Without him there is no-one in the British film industry with the skill to make thoroughly heartbreaking and depressing movies that can be watched time and again. His 2004 effort Dead Man's Shoes, starring Considine at his very best, is a classic example of Meadows ability to create desolate depictions of humanity, tweaked with humour, wrapped up in a story line that is utterly spell-binding and soul destroying. Since 2009, Meadows has turned to writing and directing a mini-series' based on his 2006 film This Is England. With a third installment of the TV version in the pipeline, This Is England '90, Meadows does not appear to be nearing a return to the feature length format. This needs to change. After five years it is time for Meadows to turn off the TV and start working on another future classic of British cinema. Such is the magnitude of his absence from our screens Considine has turned to his hand to directing with 2011's Tyrannosaur, surely an attempt to fill the Meadows shaped void upon the cinema screen landscape.