4. Richard Linklater
Another director whose diverse filmography doesn't get the recognition it deserves. His variety doesn't come so much from working in different genres as it comes from his pursuit of new forms of cinematic expression. Stylistically, his movies are closer to European cinema than to most American independent films as several of his movies focus on real-time conversations. He has consistently churned out quality work since the early 1990s with cult hits Slacker and Dazed and Confused, and has continued into the present with movies like last year's Bernie. He is also notable for two of his films (A Scanner Darkly and Waking Life) in which the actors were filmed in live-action and then animated in post production. He is most well-known in the mainstream for his comedy School of Rock but his most impressive accomplishment is his Before Sunset trilogy, a series of three minimalist romantic films centered around two people (played by Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy) meeting each other at different stages of their lives. To call it the most impressive accomplishment in the romantic drama genre would be a discredit to how good these films are.
Filmography:Slacker (1991), (Dazed and Confused), Before Sunrise (1995), subUrbia (1996), the Newton Boys(1998), Waking Life (2001), Tape (2001), School of Rock (2003), Before Sunset (2004), Bad News Bears (2005), A Scanner Darkly (2006), Fast Food Nation (2006), Me and Orson Welles (2009), Bernie (2012), Before Midnight (2013)