Film Buffs by Director.

So I stole the idea for this little article from a blog that I love dearly called ‘The Best Little Bookshelf in Texas.’ It is written by Jia Tolentino, a member of the Peace Corps working in Kyrgyzstan. Jia writes about every book that she reads and she is brilliant. 

Anyway, back to the article: Have you ever run into a self-anointed film buff who just won’t shut-the-fuck-up about a certain director? Sure you have. You’ve been to one of those borderline hipster parties where you end up cornered by a Tarantino fan trying to convince you that Reservoir Dogs is about ‘...men reclaiming their masculinity in a world dominated by the social narratives of free-market capitalism.’


Well this is a little list of what to expect from people who are be obsessed with particular directors. And if your favourite director is on the list, don’t get mad, just laugh it off. Hey man, I’m just some punk who thinks his opinion means somethin’.

So here it goes:

Woody Allen: Hopeless romantics disappointed that they haven’t found someone to talk sarcastically about literature and world events with.

Wes Anderson: Saul Bellow fans that secretly wish Bill Murray was their father.

Michael Bay: Young men that are only a few IQ points above full-blown mental retardation.

Tim Burton: Angsty teenage girls and boys who are openly bisexual just because they know it will annoy their parents.

Kenneth Branaugh: People with Ph.D’s in medieval literature who think that modern re-tellings of Shakespeare are for stupid people.

James Cameron: Scientists who like Aliens the best out of all those movies because it gave them a greater glimpse into xenomorph biology.

The Coen Brothers: People who have been clinically depressed and realise that Creedence Clearwater Revival and marijuana is a way better antidepressant than Prozac.

Francis Ford Copolla: Fifty year old men who go to fancy dress parties only in full Marlon Brando garb, complete with cotton balls (even though their wives would never let them put them in).

Sofia Copolla: Women who seriously consider committing suicide as opposed to spending another day in their stupid office cubicles at their meaningless jobs, only to go home to a marriage that didn't turn out like they expected it to.

David Cronenberg: People who hate the Star Wars prequels because there weren’t enough puppets in it.

Cameron Crowe: People who cried when Orlando Bloom cried on his road trip in Elisabethtown but who would never admit it to their friends.

Clint Eastwood: Moderate republicans who own guns and are still suspicious of minorities even though they know that Gran Torino should have taught them better.

David Fincher: Male Brad Pitt fans who tell you they’ve dabbled in nihilism, over a decaf soy latte at Starbucks.

Mel Gibson: People like Carrie’s mother.

Terry Gilliam: Slightly eccentric but brilliant math teachers who love Lewis Carroll and don’t think that ‘English Literature’ is a real subject.

Alfred Hitchcock: People who read Agatha Christie novels and get mad at movies that don’t have conventionally linear plots.

Peter Jackson: Fans of the British Office who are willing to forgive The Lovely Bones because Jackson cast Martin Freeman as Bilbo.

Stanley Kubrick: Film Theory majors who only buy DVDs if they come with hundreds of hours of bonus behind-the-scenes featurettes.

Sergio Leone: Budding male film-makers who get high and talk about how every one of Leone’s shots is “...just so fucking beautiful, man...”

George Lucas (pre 1996): People who, when they were kids, got their mothers to write fake notes so they could get out of P.E. (that’s Gym to you Americans) and draw their own sequels to Star Wars in comic book form. People like me.

George Lucas (post 1996): Children who think that the puppet Yoda in ‘Empire Strikes Back’ looks fake. Adults who are in denial that the Ewoks in ‘Jedi’ were a bit lame.

Baz Luhrman: Women who haven’t had enough of silly love songs. Men who secretly want to design just one fabulous gown without seeming gay. 

David Lynch: People who smoked a lot of pot up until they were in their thirties and had to quit because their thoughts were becoming too hellish. They replaced pot with transcendental meditation, but know deep down that it just isn’t the same.

Christopher Nolan: People who name drop famous authors even though all their books are book-marked at chapter 2.

Ridley Scott (pre 2000): People who sigh on the inside whenever someone says they prefer the cut of Blade Runner that has a voice-over.

Ridley Scott (post 2000): Working class fathers that get every ‘History’ question in Trivial Pursuit right, and understand why Russell Crowe needs to throw a phone at someone every once and a while.

Martin Scorsese: Fifty year old Rolling Stones fans who traded in gangster fantasies for down-lights and fiscal responsibility.

M. Night Shyamalan: People who have a profound respect for traditional horror film-making, but whispered ‘fuck off’ when they saw the ending of The Village.

Steven Spielberg: People who thought the best thing about having a pet mouse growing up was thinking of ways to torture it.

Quentin Tarantino: Men secretly wish they could beat the living fuck out of someone they hate and say something really cool before, and after, they do it.

Lars Von Trier: People who have undergone terrible emotional hardship in their lives and find it really hard to bite their tongue at family functions when a distant right-winged relative talks about how good The Dark Knight was.

The Wachowski Brothers: Misunderstood teenage boys who wear faux-leather trenchcoats to high school parties and think that knowing a few MSDOS commands constitutes being a 733t hacker.

John Woo: Twenty-something men who, at their first ever paint-ball session, attempted one sideways shoot-jump before hurting their ankle and hiding behind a barrel for the rest of the game.