46 replies to this topic

[Colossus]

What a tough job this is, ranking directors is far tougher than ranking actors as the director is the man, playing Bond isn't exactly Shakespeare to nail, it takes the combination of great writing and directing to make these films TRULY enjoyable.

Terence Young- Choosing his favorite 3 Fleming books to direct, laid the foundation.
Lewis Gilbert- Epic Bond.
Irvin Kershner- Master of character driven films, and puts it into fantastical stories, truly a rarity.
Guy Hamilton- DAF the only weak spot. The guy can really put it all together as shown in Goldfinger.
Peter Hunt- The master Bond editor directs. Only one film to show, happens to be quite a meaty story.
John Glen- Tough task of carrying Bond through the 80s, and doing quite well.
Martin Campbell- Did ok for Goldeneye, not going into the subsequent later 1-shot directors.

[Major Bloodnok]

What a tough job this is, ranking directors is far tougher than ranking actors as the director is the man, playing Bond isn't exactly Shakespeare to nail, it takes the combination of great writing and directing to make these films TRULY enjoyable.

Terence Young- Choosing his favorite 3 Fleming books to direct, laid the foundation.
Lewis Gilbert- Epic Bond.
Irvin Kershner- Master of character driven films, and puts it into fantastical stories, truly a rarity.
Guy Hamilton- DAF the only weak spot. The guy can really put it all together as shown in Goldfinger.
Peter Hunt- The master Bond editor directs. Only one film to show, happens to be quite a meaty story.
John Glen- Tough task of carrying Bond through the 80s, and doing quite well.
Martin Campbell- Did ok for Goldeneye, not going into the subsequent later 1-shot directors.

I would agree on most points- though I would move Kersh and Lewis Gilbert down a couple notches. Apted would be high on the list for his one off, TWINE, a movie I enjoyed immensely.

I would rank Hunt and Glen above Hamilton, onnly because Hamilton directed TMWTGG, my absolute, least favorite Bond film... or was that DAD? I guess those two are tied for least fave.

Now that I think more about it- the only one I agree with is Terrence Young! here's my list from best to worst (taken as a whole).

Best to... not best. The percentage is what I liked of their particular films. For example, Terrence made 3 GREAT Bond films. He rates 100% John Glen made 4 good ones and one stinky one. He gets 80%. For directors that to date have only made one film, like Martin Campbell, I rate him on how much of the movie I liked. Goldeneye... 45%

Terrence Young 100%
Peter Hunt 100%
Michael Apted 88%
John Glen 80%
Guy Hamilton (if it weren't for GOLDFINGER he'd be further down) 50%
Roger Spottiswoode (or however it's spelled) 49%
Martin Campbell 45%
Lewis Gilbert 33%
Irvin Kershner 31%
Lee Tomahori 007%
The combined "talents" of the Casino Royale directors. Was John Huston REALLY one of them? 3%

[Niwram]

[post deleted]

Edited by Niwram, 30 December 2005 - 10:00 AM.

[Gabriel]

The combined "talents" of the Casino Royale directors.  Was John Huston REALLY one of them?  3%

If ONLY Feldman had paid Connery

Edited by Gabriel, 29 December 2005 - 04:09 PM.

[ACE]

This is difficult because some of the directors (Hamilton, Glen) made great Bond movies and not so great Bond movies. I will list the director in descending order with their best Bond movie which justifies the ranking.

1 Guy Hamilton (Goldfinger)
2 Terence Young (Dr No)
3 Peter Hunt
4 Martin Campbell
5 Roger Spottiswoode
6 Lee Tamahori
7 Lewis Gilbert (The Spy Who Loved Me)
8 John Glen (The Living Daylights)
9 Michael Apted
10 Irvin Kershner
11 The Casino Royale brigade

[Arch Stanton]

1. Terrance Young
2. Peter Hunt
3. Martin Campbell
4. John Glenn
5. Guy Hamilton
6. Michael Apted
7. Lee Tamahori
8. Lewis Gilbert
9. Roger Spottiswoode

[Double-Oh Agent]

Critically ranked:
1. Terence Young
2. Peter Hunt
3. Guy Hamilton
4. Lewis Gilbert
5. John Glen
6. Martin Campbell
7. Irvin Kershner
8. Roger Spottiswoode
9. Michael Apted
10. Lee Tamahori

Personally ranked:
1. John Glen
2. Guy Hamilton
3. Martin Campbell
4. Terence Young
5. Peter Hunt
6. Lewis Gilbert
7. Roger Spottiswoode
8. Lee Tamahori
9. Irvin Kershner
10. Michael Apted

[K1Bond007]

1. Terence Young
2. Peter Hunt
3. Guy Hamilton
4. Lewis Gilbert
5. John Glen
6. Martin Campbell
7. Roger Spottiswoode
8. Michael Apted
9. Lee Tamahori

I'll agree with this.

[Qwerty]

• Lewis Gilbert
• Peter Hunt
• Roger Spottiswoode
• Terence Young
• John Glen
• Guy Hamilton
• Martin Campbell
• Lee Tamahori
• Michael Apted
• Irvin Kershner
• The Casino Royale...er...group

[DLibrasnow]

1. Irvin Kershner (Also directed the best of the STAR WARS movies IMO)
2. Peter Hunt
3. Lewis Gilbert
4. John Glen
5. Guy Hamilton
6. Terence Young
7. Martin Campbell
8. Lee Tamahori
9. Roger Spottiswoode
10. Michael Apted

[Scottlee]

(In order of greatness)

1 - Terrance Young
2 - Peter Hunt
3 - John Glen
4 - Guy Hamilton
5 - Lewis Gilbert
6 - Michael Apted
7 - Michael Campbell
8 - Roger Spotiswoode
9 - Lee Tamahori

[Largo65]

1. Guy Hamilton ( GOLDFINGER )
2. Terence Young ( FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE )
3. Peter Hunt
4. Irvin Kershner
5. Lewis Gilbert ( YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE )
6. John Glen ( THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS )
7. Martin Campbell
8. Roger Spottiswoode
9. Michael Apted
10. Lee Tomahori

Edited by Largo65, 30 December 2005 - 09:36 PM.

[0047]

1. Guy Hamilton
2. Lewis Gilbert
3. Martin Campbell
4. John Glen
5. Terence Young
6. Roger Spottiswoode
7. Lee Tamahori
8. Michael Apted
9. Peter Hunt
10. Irvin Kershner

[MarcAngeDraco]

As several others have noted, this is very difficult to do (primarily because some directors have done multiple films of which some are better than others). So I have tried two methods: 1) ranking by best film only and 2) ranking by all films. Also note, I have only used the 20 EON films.

Ranked using their best film only:

Terence Young (DN)
Guy Hamilton (GF)
John Glen (LD)
Peter Hunt
Martin Campbell
Lewis Gilbert (SWLM)
Michael Apted
Lee Tamahori
Roger Spottiswoode


Ranked using all of their films:

Terence Young
Peter Hunt
Guy Hamilton
Martin Campbell
John Glen
Michael Apted
Lewis Gilbert
Lee Tamahori
Roger Spottiswoode

Having done this today, I'm sure it would look different tomorrow...

[spynovelfan]

I notice a few people have put Guy Hamilton at the top, and cited GOLDFINGER because of it. If Terence Young is to be believed, though, *he* did a lot of the pre-production on that film and even did some post-production editing with Peter Hunt. EON apparently thought Hamilton's cut was so dire they were planning to hold it and put out THUNDERBALL first!

Yes, of course I'm going to source it. Richard Schenkman's 1981 interview with Young in BONDAGE magazine. What do we make of this, then?

'B: And then you left. Was it because you didn't want to do any more Bonds? Like Sean Connery, you didn't want to be typed? Were you just too busy?

Y: I did Dr. No, and I did From Russia With Love, it was two things . . . we did a lot of the work on Goldfinger. Quite a lot of the casting was done at that time, but I kept saying that I thought for a director it was a dead end.

B: But you had done two completely different films.

Y: Yes, but the idea of going on and making a James Bond film a year for the next ten years . . . it's just not my bag. I want to do something else. I've been blamed many times for not having a style of my own. They say it's because I'm always doing something different, but that's what I like doing. Jack Ford developed a style because he made thirty westerns. But it's very difficult to find any style with Howard Hawks. He made every different picture under the sun and that's what appeals to me. I've done a western, I'd like to do another. I've done what is, I think, a pretty good suspense picture called Wait Until Dark, and I'd like to do another of those. I may do the next James Bond. If it's the last one then I probably would do it. If they're going to make more I wouldn't want to do it, but if it's the last it'll be a good rounding out. If I was going to do it, I think one should go back to making a real James Bond as they were in the beginning. I don't think anyone in this generation has seen what we're talking about. It's twenty years since we started.

B: Well, anyway, you left after doing some preproduction on Goldfinger.

Y: Yes, I went off and made a film called Moll Flanders which couldn't have been more different because it was almost like a restoration romp, you know, an 18th century romp like Tom Jones. And then, they, apparently, didn't like Goldfinger when it was finished. They thought the picture was not going to be a success. The idea was that I was brought back to do Thunderball, and they were going to put Thunderball out before Goldfinger. It just shows how much people know about movies. The idea was to run Thunderball and then put Goldfinger out a week later or something like that. It just shows, because Goldfinger became the most popular one they had up until then.

B: Why didn't they do it the way they'd planned?

Y: They re-edited . . . in fact, I consoled them. I saw the film and I told them I thought it was a damn good picture. I told them I thought they should make some cuts, which they did.

B: What were some of the problems with it?

Y: One of the big problems with Goldfinger was that Bond got captured and put in jail very early in the film. I went back and I did a little work on it with Peter Hunt, and what we did was try to take some of the scenes that came later, and put them before, so that he wasn't captured until about the fifth reel. In the films that we'd made to date, he got into the villains hands in the last reel or two of the picture, but certainly an hour had passed before he was in jeopardy. But in that one he was captured in the first thirty minutes. I thought it was a defect in the storyline.'

[tdalton]

1. John Glen
2. Terence Young
3. Peter Hunt
4. Lewis Gilbert
5. Guy Hamilton
6. Michael Apted
7. Martin Campbell
8. Roger Spotiswoode
9. Lee Tamahori

[Nicolas Suszczyk]

The best were Terence Young, Guy Hamilton, John Glen, Roger Spottiswoode and Martin Campbell.

Need more time to rank the others.

The worst is Lee Tamahori.

[Blue07]

Guy Hamilton top for me. Great director. John Glen for maintaining standards (even AVTAK) through five films comes a close second. Gilbert and Young in a tie for third.

[Kingdom Come]

1/ Lewis Gilbert 99% made the films stylish and fantastic.
2/ Guy Hamilton 90% made the films quirky and fast paced.
3/ Lee Tamahori 90% made the films surreal again and his film the 2nd most popular ever.


I'd rather not rate any of the others.

[Nicolas Suszczyk]

I forgot Peter Hunt... He's also in 1st place.

[MillesGloriosus]

Best to... not best. The percentage is what I liked of their particular films. For example, Terrence made 3 GREAT Bond films. He rates 100% John Glen made 4 good ones and one stinky one. He gets 80%. For directors that to date have only made one film, like Martin Campbell, I rate him on how much of the movie I liked. Goldeneye... 45%

Terrence Young 100%
Peter Hunt 100%
Michael Apted 88%
John Glen 80%
Guy Hamilton (if it weren't for GOLDFINGER he'd be further down) 50%
Roger Spottiswoode (or however it's spelled) 49%
Martin Campbell 45%
Lewis Gilbert 33%
Irvin Kershner 31%
Lee Tomahori 007%
The combined "talents" of the Casino Royale directors. Was John Huston REALLY one of them? 3%

Lee Tomahori, you're a bad man. You know what we do with bad men? We punish them. Lee, you've just been credited with directing xXx - State of the Union

Welcome to the Xander Zone

Edited by MillesGloriosus, 14 March 2006 - 06:51 PM.

[dunmall]

starting at the top on down:

terence young
peter hunt
guy hamilton
martin cambell
lewis gilbert
john glen
michael apted
roger spotswood (sp??)
lee tamahori

[Colossus]

You missed Irvin Kershner.

[dunmall]

bugger but then i have to count all the CR guys too! lol

I would put Val Guest at the top of that list mind you. Followed by the 2nd unit chap who organised the final battle... God I love that bit!!!

But seriously I only looked at the EON guys on purpose, not out of dislike for the unofficial guys but just because I really couldn't be bothered.

[Captain Grimes]

1. Terence Young
2. Lewis Gilbert
3. John Glen
4. Guy Hamilton
5. Peter Hunt
6. Michael Apted
7. Martin Campbell
8. Roger Spottiswoode
9. Lee Tamahori

[SecretAgentFan]

Somehow I find it hard to rank them - because they all made very good films. Even DAD has lots of entertaining stuff in it and it is well directed, although I find some choices not so successful.

Also, revisiting those Bond films I didn

[Pierce_Brosnan]

I will have to go with the most obvious choice and say Terence Young though I encourage you to do others (if so) such as: Guy Hamilton, Peter Hunt, etc. or even 1 hit wonders like Martin Campbell who you guys know is directing the new CR.

[Qwerty]

Merged your topic into this one, Pierce_Brosnan.

[Pierce_Brosnan]

Merged your topic into this one, Pierce_Brosnan.

Oh thank you Qwerty! I searched but I did not find this sorry!

[Qwerty]

No problem!