10 Promising & Big-Name Directors Who Turned To The Small Screen

When one thinks of neo-noir, a few names immediately leap to mind. The Wachowskis flipping the script with their lesbian caper Bound; the cold, undefeatable truth of Roman Polanski's Chinatown; Robert Altman's mumble, shaggy dog story of a detective thriller The Long Goodbye. But lesser-known names played a hand in switching up the genre, but with little fanfare.

John Dahl made a name for himself when The Last Seduction hit HBO. While it has an undeserved reputation as another in a long line of "Skin e-max" films that came out in the early 90s, the screenwriter and Dahl covertly set out to make a good movie.

It's hard to get the Skinemax rep off your collar, particularly when the film inspired a DTV sequel that was what ITC FIlms had hoped they were initially getting in 1994. But just a glance at Dahl's CV prove he was a serious contender for one of the best revisionist noir filmmakers out there: along with Seduction, he released You Kill Me, Kill Me Again, Unforgettable, Rounders and Red Rock West, which features a Dennis Hopper performance on par with Frank in Blue Velvet.

Dahl even had limited success in the mainstream, directing fromJoy Ride from J.J. Abrams' script. But in recent years, he's spent more and more time in the world of cable. There are few shows Dahl hasn't lent his skills to, from Californication to Billions, Justified, Hannibal, Jessica Jones, Evil and most recently AppleTV's Servant.