4. Guy Ritchie (44)
Filmography Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels (1998), Snatch (2000), Swept Away (2002), Revolver (2005), Sherlock Holmes (2009), Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows (2011). London gangster films are a dime a dozen and most of them are absolutely terrible (any that star Danny Dyer, to start). There is the occasional exception, however, such as the first two entries in Guy Ritchies filmography. The first of the two, Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels, sees four friends trying to raise £100,000 to pay off their debt to a gangster, whilst the second, Snatch, was somewhat more farcical in nature and featured an ensemble cast of characters whose lives become intertwined by the movements of a stolen diamond. The pair of films introduced the world to Jason Statham, previously best known as a diver, who has since become a staple of the action genre. Well glance over 2002s Swept Away, which was an absolute travesty of a film that Ritchie likely made only to appease Madonna, his wife at the time of its release. Similarly best avoided is 2005s Revolver, a complicated Vegas-set film overwhelmed by Kabbalah influences. 2008s RockNRolla was a return to form, starring then-rising stars such as Gerard Butler, Tom Hardy, Mark Strong and Toby Kebbell. Despite it being designed as the first film in a trilogy, no sequels have followed, as Ritchie instead took to the directors chair for a pair of Sherlock Holmes stories with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law in the respective roles of Holmes and Watson. His involvement in a new adaptation of Treasure Island has recently been announced, but Ritchie has also been given odds of 4/1 to direct the next Bond film, which is an interesting prospect, to say the least.