Academy Award for Best Director

history

{| class="infobox vcard" style="width:27em; font-size:90%;" cellspacing="2" |- | colspan="2" style="text-align:center; font-size:larger; background-color:#ed8;" class="fn" | Academy Award for Best Director |- | Awarded for | "Achievement in cinematic direction" |- | Presented by | Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences |- | Country | United States |- | First awarded | 1929 (for direction in films released in 19271928) |- | First winner | Frank Borzage,
Seventh Heaven (1927) |- | Currently held by | Kathryn Bigelow,
The Hurt Locker (2009) |- ! colspan=2|»Official website |}

The Academy Award for Achievement in Directing (Best Director) is one of the Awards of Merit presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) to directors working in the motion picture industry. While nominations for Best Director are made by members in the Academy's Directing branch, the award winners are selected by the Academy membership as a whole.

History

Throughout the past 80 years, accounting for ties and repeat winners, AMPAS has presented a total of 82 Best Director awards to 62 different directors. At the 1st Academy Awards (19271928), there were two directing awardsβ€”one for "Dramatic Direction" and one for "Comedy Direction". The Comedy Direction award was eliminated the next year and, indeed, the awards have overwhelmingly favored dramatic films ever since. At both the 34th Academy Awards (1961) and the 80th Academy Awards (2007), Best Director was presented to a co-directing team, rather than to an individual director.

The earliest years of the award were marked by inconsistency and confusion. In the Academy Awards' first year, actors and others such as cinematographers were nominated for all of their films produced during the qualifying period. However, since the directing award was for "directing" rather than "best director", it honored the director in association with only a single filmβ€”thus Janet Gaynor has two Frank Borzage films listed after her Best Actress nomination, but only one of them earned Borzage a directing nomination. The second year, the directing award followed the others in listing all of a director's work during the qualifying period, resulting in Frank Lloyd being nominated for three of his filmsβ€”but, even more confusingly, only one of them was listed on the final award as the film for which he won. Finally, for the 1930/31 awards, this confusing system was replaced by the current system in which a director is nominated for a single film.

The Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Picture have been very closely linked throughout their history. Of the 80 films that have been awarded Best Picture, 59 have also been awarded Best Director.[http://awardsdatabase.oscars.org/ampas_awards/help/statistics/bestpixdirdiff.html] Only three films have won Best Picture without their directors being nominated (though only one since the early 1930s): Wings (1927/28), Grand Hotel (1931/32), and Driving Miss Daisy (1989). The only two Best Director winners to win for films which did not receive a Best Picture nomination are likewise in the early years: Lewis Milestone (1927/28) and Frank Lloyd (1928/29).

Due to strict rules promulgated by the Directors Guild of America (DGA), only one individual may claim screen credit as a film's director. (This rule is designed to prevent rights and ownership issues and to eliminate lobbying for director credit by producers and actors.) However, the DGA may create an exception to this "one director per film" rule if two co-directors seeking to share director credit for a film qualify as an "established duo". In the history of the Academy Awards, established duos have been nominated for Best Director only three times: Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins (who won for West Side Story in 1961); Warren Beatty and Buck Henry (who were nominated for Heaven Can Wait in 1978), and Joel Coen and Ethan Coen (who won for No Country for Old Men in 2007).

Eight people have been nominated for both Best Director and Best Actor for the same film. Warren Beatty did so twice (Heaven Can Wait and Reds), as did Clint Eastwood (Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby). The other six included: Orson Welles (Citizen Kane), Laurence Olivier (Hamlet), Woody Allen (Annie Hall), Kenneth Branagh (Henry V), Kevin Costner (Dances with Wolves), and Roberto Benigni (Life Is Beautiful). No one has ever won both awards. Four won Best Director, but not Best Actor: Allen, Beatty (for Reds), Costner, and Eastwood (on both occasions). Two won Best Actor, but not Best Director: Benigni and Olivier. Finally, three lost both nominations: Beatty (for Heaven Can Wait), Branagh, and Welles (though he did win a Screenplay Oscar for Citizen Kane).

No Best Director winning film is lost, though the nominee The Patriot is lost and nominee Sorrell and Son is incomplete. Drag (one of the films for which Frank Lloyd was nominated but did not win in 1929) has long been presumed lost, though there are rumors of its survival, possibly only on videotape, and the Vitaphone discs of its soundtrack survive. The Comedy Direction winner, Two Arabian Knights, was believed lost for many years but was preserved in the Howard Hughes archive and has been broadcast (along with another first-year nominee produced by Hughes and believed lost, The Racket) on Turner Classic Movies.

Superlatives

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center" |- !width="250"|Category !width="350"|Name !width="250"|Superlative !width="150"|Year !width="350"|Notes |- |Most Awards |John Ford |4 awards |1952 |Awards resulted from 5 nominations. |- |Most Nominations |William Wyler |12 nominations |1965 |Nominations resulted in 3 awards. |- |Oldest Winner |Clint Eastwood |74 years old |2004 |Million Dollar Baby |- |Oldest Nominee |John Huston |79 years old |1985 |Prizzi's Honor |- |Youngest Winner |Norman Taurog |32 years old |1930/31 |Skippy |- |Youngest Nominee |John Singleton |24 years old |1991 |Boyz N the Hood |}

John Ford has won the most Best Director Oscars - 4, followed by Frank Capra and William Wyler, with three apiece. Wyler has the most nominations - 12. Robert Altman, Clarence Brown, Alfred Hitchcock, and King Vidor are tied for the most nominations without a win, at five each.

Only two directors have received consecutive Best Director awards: John Ford for 1940's The Grapes of Wrath and 1941's How Green Was My Valley, and Joseph L. Mankiewicz for 1949's A Letter to Three Wives and 1950's All About Eve.

No African-American has ever won best director, and only two have ever been nominated: John Singleton for 1991's Boyz n the Hood and Lee Daniels for 2009's .

Ang Lee is the only Asian (and non-Caucasian) to have won the prize, for 2005's Brokeback Mountain. Other Asian nominees are Hiroshi Teshigahara for Woman of the Dunes, Akira Kurosawa for Ran, and M. Night Shyamalan for The Sixth Sense.

Kathryn Bigelow, with 2009's The Hurt Locker, is the only woman to have ever won Best Director. Other female nominees are Lina WertmΓΌller for 1976's Seven Beauties, Jane Campion for 1993's The Piano and Sofia Coppola for 2003's Lost in Translation.»Female directors remain a rarity in Hollywood.

Four people known to be LGBT have won the award: Jerome Robbins for West Side Story, Tony Richardson for Tom Jones, George Cukor for My Fair Lady and John Schlesinger for Midnight Cowboy. At least seven others have been nominated: Pedro Almodovar, Lee Daniels, Stephen Daldry, James Ivory, Rob Marshall, Gus Van Sant and Franco Zeffirelli.

Multiple nominations

The following 83 directors (counting Joel and Ethan Coen as one) have received multiple Best Director nominations. The list is sorted by the number of total awards (with the number of total nominations listed in parentheses).

Winners and nominees

Each Academy Award ceremony is listed chronologically below along with the winner of the Academy Award for Directing and the film associated with the award. In the column next to the winner of each award are the other nominees for best director. Following the Academy's practice, the films below are listed by the years of their Los Angeles qualifying run, which is usually (but not always) in the year of release; for example, the Oscar for Best Director of 1999 was announced during the award ceremony held in 2000.

1920s

In the first year only, the award was separated into Dramatic Direction and Comedy Direction.

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1927/1928
Dramatic | Frank Borzage
 β€“ Seventh Heaven | Herbert Brenon – Sorrell and Son
King Vidor – The Crowd |- | align="center"| 1927/1928
Comedy | Lewis Milestone
 β€“ Two Arabian Knights | Ted Wilde – Speedy |- | align="center"| 1928/1929 | Frank Lloyd
 β€“ The Divine Lady | Lionel Barrymore – Madame X
Harry Beaumont – The Broadway Melody
Irving Cummings – In Old Arizona
Frank Lloyd - Drag
Ernst Lubitsch – The Patriot |- | align="center"| 1929/1930 | Lewis Milestone
 β€“ All Quiet on the Western Front | Clarence Brown – Anna Christie and Romance
Robert Z. Leonard – The DivorcΓ©e
Ernst Lubitsch – The Love Parade
King Vidor – Hallelujah |}

1930s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1930/1931 | Norman Taurog
 β€“ Skippy | Clarence Brown – A Free Soul
Lewis Milestone – The Front Page
Wesley Ruggles – Cimarron
Josef von Sternberg – Morocco |- | align="center"| 1931/1932 | Frank Borzage
 β€“ Bad Girl | King Vidor – The Champ
Josef von Sternberg – Shanghai Express |- | align="center"| 1932/1933 | Frank Lloyd
 β€“ Cavalcade | Frank Capra – Lady for a Day
George Cukor – Little Women (The Academy also announced that Capra came in second, and Cukor last.) |- | align="center"| 1934 | Frank Capra
 β€“ It Happened One Night | Victor Schertzinger – One Night of Love
W. S. Van Dyke – The Thin Man (The Academy also announced that Van Dyke came in second, and Schertzinger last.) |- | align="center"| 1935 | John Ford
 β€“ The Informer | Henry Hathaway – The Lives of a Bengal Lancer
Frank Lloyd – Mutiny on the Bounty (The Academy also announced that write-in candidate Michael Curtiz, for Captain Blood, came in second, and Hathaway third.) |- | align="center"| 1936 | Frank Capra
 β€“ Mr. Deeds Goes to Town | Gregory La Cava – My Man Godfrey
Robert Z. Leonard – The Great Ziegfeld
W. S. Van Dyke – San Francisco
William Wyler – Dodsworth |- | align="center"| 1937 | Leo McCarey
 β€“ The Awful Truth |William Dieterle – The Life of Emile Zola
Sidney Franklin – The Good Earth
Gregory La Cava – Stage Door
William A. Wellman – A Star Is Born |- | align="center"| 1938 | Frank Capra
 β€“ You Can't Take It with You | Michael Curtiz – Angels with Dirty Faces
Michael Curtiz – Four Daughters
Norman Taurog – Boys Town
King Vidor – The Citadel |- | align="center"| 1939 | Victor Fleming
 β€“ Gone with the Wind | Frank Capra – Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
John Ford – Stagecoach
Sam Wood – Goodbye, Mr. Chips
William Wyler – Wuthering Heights |}

1940s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- |- | align="center"| 1940 | John Ford
 β€“ The Grapes of Wrath | George Cukor – The Philadelphia Story
Alfred Hitchcock – Rebecca
Sam Wood – Kitty Foyle
William Wyler – The Letter |- | align="center"| 1941 | John Ford
 β€“ How Green Was My Valley | Alexander Hall – Here Comes Mr. Jordan
Howard Hawks – Sergeant York
Orson Welles – Citizen Kane
William Wyler – The Little Foxes |- | align="center"| 1942 | William Wyler
 β€“ Mrs. Miniver | Michael Curtiz – Yankee Doodle Dandy
John Farrow – Wake Island
Mervyn LeRoy – Random Harvest
Sam Wood – Kings Row |- | align="center"| 1943 | Michael Curtiz
 β€“ Casablanca | Clarence Brown – The Human Comedy
Henry King – The Song of Bernadette
Ernst Lubitsch – Heaven Can Wait
George Stevens – The More the Merrier |- | align="center"| 1944 | Leo McCarey
 β€“ Going My Way | Alfred Hitchcock – Lifeboat
Henry King – Wilson
Otto Preminger – Laura
Billy Wilder – Double Indemnity |- | align="center"| 1945 | Billy Wilder
 β€“ The Lost Weekend | Clarence Brown – National Velvet
Alfred Hitchcock – Spellbound
Leo McCarey – The Bells of St. Mary's
Jean Renoir – The Southerner |- | align="center"| 1946 | William Wyler
 β€“ The Best Years of Our Lives | Clarence Brown – The Yearling
Frank Capra – It's a Wonderful Life
David Lean – Brief Encounter
Robert Siodmak – The Killers |- | align="center"| 1947 | Elia Kazan
 β€“ Gentleman's Agreement | George Cukor – A Double Life
Edward Dmytryk – Crossfire
Henry Koster – The Bishop's Wife
David Lean – Great Expectations |- | align="center"| 1948 | John Huston
 β€“ The Treasure of the Sierra Madre | Anatole Litvak – The Snake Pit
Jean Negulesco – Johnny Belinda
Laurence Olivier – Hamlet
Fred Zinnemann – The Search |- | align="center"| 1949 | Joseph L. Mankiewicz
 β€“ A Letter to Three Wives | Carol Reed – The Fallen Idol
Robert Rossen – All the King's Men
William A. Wellman – Battleground
William Wyler – The Heiress |}

1950s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1950 | Joseph L. Mankiewicz
 β€“ All About Eve | George Cukor – Born Yesterday
John Huston – The Asphalt Jungle
Carol Reed – The Third Man
Billy Wilder – Sunset Boulevard |- | align="center"| 1951 | George Stevens
 β€“ A Place in the Sun | John Huston – The African Queen
Elia Kazan – A Streetcar Named Desire
Vincente Minnelli – An American in Paris
William Wyler – Detective Story'' |- | align="center"| 1952 | John Ford
 β€“ The Quiet Man | Cecil B. DeMille – The Greatest Show on Earth
John Huston – Moulin Rouge
Joseph L. Mankiewicz – 5 Fingers
Fred Zinnemann – High Noon |- | align="center"| 1953 | Fred Zinnemann
 β€“ From Here to Eternity | George Stevens – Shane
Charles Walters – Lili
Billy Wilder – Stalag 17
William Wyler – Roman Holiday |- | align="center"| 1954 | Elia Kazan
 β€“ On the Waterfront | Alfred Hitchcock – Rear Window
George Seaton – The Country Girl
William A. Wellman – The High and the Mighty
Billy Wilder – Sabrina |- | align="center"| 1955 | Delbert Mann
 β€“ Marty | Elia Kazan – East of Eden
David Lean – Summertime
Joshua Logan – Picnic
John Sturges – Bad Day at Black Rock |- | align="center"| 1956 | George Stevens
 β€“ Giant | Michael Anderson – Around the World in 80 Days
Walter Lang – The King and I
King Vidor – War and Peace
William Wyler – Friendly Persuasion |- | align="center"| 1957 | David Lean
 β€“ The Bridge on the River Kwai | Joshua Logan – Sayonara
Sidney Lumet – 12 Angry Men
Mark Robson – Peyton Place
Billy Wilder – Witness for the Prosecution |- | align="center"| 1958 | Vincente Minnelli
 β€“ Gigi | Richard Brooks – Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Stanley Kramer – The Defiant Ones
Mark Robson – The Inn of the Sixth Happiness
Robert Wise – I Want to Live! |- | align="center"| 1959 | William Wyler
 β€“ Ben-Hur | Jack Clayton – Room at the Top
George Stevens – The Diary of Anne Frank
Billy Wilder – Some Like It Hot
Fred Zinnemann – The Nun's Story |}

1960s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1960 | Billy Wilder
 β€“ The Apartment | Jack Cardiff – Sons and Lovers
Jules Dassin – Never on Sunday
Alfred Hitchcock – Psycho
Fred Zinnemann – The Sundowners |- | align="center"| 1961 | Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins
 β€“ West Side Story | Federico Fellini – La Dolce Vita
Stanley Kramer – Judgment at Nuremberg
Robert Rossen – The Hustler
J. Lee Thompson – The Guns of Navarone |- | align="center"| 1962 | David Lean
 β€“ Lawrence of Arabia | Pietro Germi – Divorce, Italian Style
Robert Mulligan – To Kill a Mockingbird
Arthur Penn – The Miracle Worker
Frank Perry – David and Lisa |- | align="center"| 1963 | Tony Richardson
 β€“ Tom Jones | Federico Fellini – 8Β½
Elia Kazan – America, America
Otto Preminger – The Cardinal
Martin Ritt – Hud |- | align="center"| 1964 | George Cukor
 β€“ My Fair Lady | Michael Cacoyannis – Zorba the Greek
Peter Glenville – Becket
Stanley Kubrick – Dr. Strangelove
Robert Stevenson – Mary Poppins |- | align="center"| 1965 | Robert Wise
 β€“ The Sound of Music | David Lean – Doctor Zhivago
John Schlesinger – Darling
Hiroshi Teshigahara – Woman in the Dunes
William Wyler – The Collector |- | align="center"| 1966 | Fred Zinnemann
 β€“ A Man for All Seasons | Michelangelo Antonioni – Blowup
Richard Brooks – The Professionals
Claude Lelouch – A Man and a Woman
Mike Nichols – Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? |- | align="center"| 1967 | Mike Nichols
 β€“ The Graduate | Richard Brooks – In Cold Blood
Norman Jewison – In the Heat of the Night
Stanley Kramer – Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
Arthur Penn – Bonnie and Clyde |- | align="center"| 1968 | Carol Reed
 β€“ Oliver! | Anthony Harvey – The Lion in Winter
Stanley Kubrick –
Gillo Pontecorvo – The Battle of Algiers
Franco Zeffirelli – Romeo and Juliet |- | align="center"| 1969 | John Schlesinger
 β€“ Midnight Cowboy | Costa Gavras – Z
George Roy Hill – Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Arthur Penn – Alice's Restaurant
Sydney Pollack – They Shoot Horses, Don't They? |}

1970s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1970 | Franklin J. Schaffner
 β€“ Patton | Robert Altman – MASH
Federico Fellini – Satyricon
Arthur Hiller – Love Story
Ken Russell – Women in Love |- | align="center"| 1971 | William Friedkin
 β€“ The French Connection | Peter Bogdanovich – The Last Picture Show
Norman Jewison – Fiddler on the Roof
Stanley Kubrick – A Clockwork Orange
John Schlesinger – Sunday Bloody Sunday |- | align="center"| 1972 | Bob Fosse
 β€“ Cabaret | John Boorman – Deliverance
Francis Ford Coppola – The Godfather
Joseph L. Mankiewicz – Sleuth
Jan Troell – The Emigrants |- | align="center"| 1973 | George Roy Hill
 β€“ The Sting | Ingmar Bergman – Cries and Whispers
Bernardo Bertolucci - Last Tango in Paris
William Friedkin - The Exorcist
George Lucas – American Graffiti |- | align="center"| 1974 | Francis Ford Coppola
 β€“ The Godfather Part II | John Cassavetes – A Woman Under the Influence
Bob Fosse – Lenny
Roman Polanski – Chinatown
FranΓ§ois Truffaut – Day for Night |- | align="center"| 1975 | MiloΕ‘ Forman
 β€“ One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest | Robert Altman – Nashville
Federico Fellini – Amarcord
Stanley Kubrick – Barry Lyndon
Sidney Lumet – Dog Day Afternoon |- | align="center"| 1976 | John G. Avildsen
 β€“ Rocky | Ingmar Bergman – Face to Face
Sidney Lumet – Network
Alan J. Pakula – All the President's Men
Lina WertmΓΌller – Seven Beauties |- | align="center"| 1977 | Woody Allen
 β€“ Annie Hall | George Lucas –
Herbert Ross – The Turning Point
Steven Spielberg – Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Fred Zinnemann – Julia |- | align="center"| 1978 | Michael Cimino
 β€“ The Deer Hunter | Woody Allen – Interiors
Hal Ashby – Coming Home
Warren Beatty & Buck Henry – Heaven Can Wait
Alan Parker – Midnight Express |- | align="center"| 1979 | Robert Benton
 β€“ Kramer vs. Kramer | Francis Ford Coppola – Apocalypse Now
Bob Fosse – All That Jazz
Γ‰douard Molinaro – La Cage aux Folles
Peter Yates – Breaking Away |}

1980s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1980 | Robert Redford
 β€“ Ordinary People | David Lynch – The Elephant Man
Roman Polanski – Tess
Richard Rush – The Stunt Man
Martin Scorsese – Raging Bull |- | align="center"| 1981 | Warren Beatty
 β€“ Reds | Hugh Hudson – Chariots of Fire
Louis Malle – Atlantic City
Mark Rydell – On Golden Pond
Steven Spielberg – Raiders of the Lost Ark |- | align="center"| 1982 | Richard Attenborough
 β€“ Gandhi | Sidney Lumet – The Verdict
Wolfgang Petersen – Das Boot
Sydney Pollack – Tootsie
Steven Spielberg – E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial |- | align="center"| 1983 | James L. Brooks
 β€“ Terms of Endearment | Bruce Beresford – Tender Mercies
Ingmar Bergman – Fanny and Alexander
Mike Nichols – Silkwood
Peter Yates – The Dresser |- | align="center"| 1984 | MiloΕ‘ Forman
 β€“ Amadeus | Woody Allen – Broadway Danny Rose
Robert Benton – Places in the Heart
Roland JoffΓ© – The Killing Fields
David Lean – A Passage to India |- | align="center"| 1985 | Sydney Pollack
 β€“ Out of Africa | HΓ©ctor Babenco – Kiss of the Spider Woman
John Huston – Prizzi's Honor
Akira Kurosawa – Ran
Peter Weir – Witness |- | align="center"| 1986 | Oliver Stone
 β€“ Platoon | Woody Allen – Hannah and Her Sisters
James Ivory – A Room with a View
Roland JoffΓ© – The Mission
David Lynch – Blue Velvet |- | align="center"| 1987 | Bernardo Bertolucci
 β€“ The Last Emperor | John Boorman – Hope and Glory
Lasse HallstrΓΆm – My Life as a Dog
Norman Jewison – Moonstruck
Adrian Lyne – Fatal Attraction |- | align="center"| 1988 | Barry Levinson
 β€“ Rain Man | Charles Crichton – A Fish Called Wanda
Mike Nichols – Working Girl
Alan Parker – Mississippi Burning
Martin Scorsese – The Last Temptation of Christ |- | align="center"| 1989 | Oliver Stone
 β€“ Born on the Fourth of July | Woody Allen – Crimes and Misdemeanors
Kenneth Branagh – Henry V
Jim Sheridan – My Left Foot
Peter Weir – Dead Poets Society |}

1990s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 1990 | Kevin Costner
 β€“ Dances with Wolves | Francis Ford Coppola – The Godfather Part III
Stephen Frears – The Grifters
Barbet Schroeder – Reversal of Fortune
Martin Scorsese – Goodfellas |- | align="center"| 1991 | Jonathan Demme
 β€“ The Silence of the Lambs | Barry Levinson – Bugsy
Ridley Scott – Thelma & Louise
John Singleton – Boyz n the Hood
Oliver Stone – JFK |- | align="center"| 1992 | Clint Eastwood
 β€“ Unforgiven | Robert Altman – The Player
Martin Brest – Scent of a Woman
James Ivory – Howards End
Neil Jordan – The Crying Game |- | align="center"| 1993 | Steven Spielberg
 β€“ Schindler's List | Robert Altman – Short Cuts
Jane Campion – The Piano
James Ivory – The Remains of the Day
Jim Sheridan – In the Name of the Father |- | align="center"| 1994 | Robert Zemeckis
 β€“ Forrest Gump | Woody Allen – Bullets Over Broadway
Krzysztof KieΕ›lowski –
Robert Redford – Quiz Show
Quentin Tarantino – Pulp Fiction |- | align="center"| 1995 | Mel Gibson
 β€“ Braveheart | Mike Figgis – Leaving Las Vegas
Chris Noonan – Babe
Michael Radford – Il Postino
Tim Robbins – Dead Man Walking |- | align="center"| 1996 | Anthony Minghella
 β€“ The English Patient | Joel Coen – Fargo
MiloΕ‘ Forman – The People vs. Larry Flynt
Scott Hicks – Shine
Mike Leigh – Secrets & Lies |- | align="center"| 1997 | James Cameron
 β€“ Titanic | Peter Cattaneo – The Full Monty
Atom Egoyan – The Sweet Hereafter
Curtis Hanson – L.A. Confidential
Gus Van Sant – Good Will Hunting |- | align="center"| 1998 | Steven Spielberg
 β€“ Saving Private Ryan | Roberto Benigni – Life Is Beautiful
John Madden – Shakespeare in Love
Terrence Malick – The Thin Red Line
Peter Weir – The Truman Show |- | align="center"| 1999 | Sam Mendes
 β€“ American Beauty | Lasse HallstrΓΆm – The Cider House Rules
Spike Jonze – Being John Malkovich
Michael Mann – The Insider
M. Night Shyamalan – The Sixth Sense |}

2000s

{|class="wikitable" !width="50"|Year !width="250"|Winner
film !width="550"|Nominated |- | align="center"| 2000 | Steven Soderbergh
 β€“ Traffic | Stephen Daldry – Billy Elliot
Ang Lee – Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Ridley Scott – Gladiator
Steven Soderbergh – Erin Brockovich |- | align="center"| 2001 | Ron Howard
 β€“ A Beautiful Mind | Robert Altman – Gosford Park
Peter Jackson –
David Lynch – Mulholland Drive
Ridley Scott – Black Hawk Down |- | align="center"| 2002 | Roman Polanski
 β€“ The Pianist | Pedro AlmodΓ³var – Talk to Her
Stephen Daldry – The Hours
Rob Marshall – Chicago
Martin Scorsese – Gangs of New York |- | align="center"| 2003 | Peter Jackson
 β€“ | Sofia Coppola – Lost in Translation
Clint Eastwood – Mystic River
Fernando Meirelles – City of God
Peter Weir – |- | align="center"| 2004 | Clint Eastwood
 β€“ Million Dollar Baby | Taylor Hackford – Ray
Mike Leigh – Vera Drake
Alexander Payne – Sideways
Martin Scorsese – The Aviator |- | align="center"| 2005 | Ang Lee
 β€“ Brokeback Mountain | George Clooney – Good Night, and Good Luck.
Paul Haggis – Crash
Bennett Miller – Capote
Steven Spielberg – Munich |- | align="center"| 2006 | Martin Scorsese
 β€“ The Departed | Clint Eastwood – Letters from Iwo Jima
Stephen Frears – The Queen
Alejandro GonzΓ‘lez IΓ±Γ‘rritu – Babel
Paul Greengrass – United 93 |- | align="center"| 2007 | Joel & Ethan Coen
 β€“ No Country for Old Men | Paul Thomas Anderson – There Will Be Blood
Tony Gilroy – Michael Clayton
Jason Reitman – Juno
Julian Schnabel – The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
|- | align="center" | 2008 | Danny Boyle
 β€“ Slumdog Millionaire | Stephen Daldry – The Reader
David Fincher – The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Ron Howard – Frost/Nixon
Gus Van Sant – Milk
|- | align="center" | 2009 | Kathryn Bigelow
 β€“ The Hurt Locker |James Cameron – Avatar
Lee Daniels –
Jason Reitman – Up in the Air
Quentin Tarantino – Inglourious Basterds |- ''''''Deuce Bigelow - The Hurt Locker'''''''''''Bold text |}

International presence

As the Academy Awards are based in the United States and are centered on the Hollywood film industry, the majority of Academy Award winners have been Americans. Nonetheless, there is significant international presence at the awards, as evidenced by the following list of winners of the Academy Award for Best Director.

However, no director has won for a film that is entirely in a foreign language.

There have been 20 directors nominated for films entirely or significantly in a foreign (non-English) language.

  • Federico Fellini (nominated for 4 films, which were all in Italian)
  • Ingmar Bergman (nominated for 3 films, which were all in Swedish)
  • Pietro Germi (Italian)
  • Hiroshi Teshigahara (Japanese)
  • Claude Lelouch (French)
  • Gillo Pontecorvo (Italian-born director nominated for The Battle of Algiers, which was in French and Arabic)
  • Costa Gavras (Greek-born director nominated for French-language film Z.)
  • Jan Troell (Swedish)
  • Francois Truffaut (French)
  • Lina Wertmuller (Italian)
  • Edouard Molinaro (French)
  • Wolfgang Petersen (German)
  • Akira Kurosawa (Japanese)
  • Lasse Hallstrom (Swedish. He was also nominated for the English-language film The Cider House Rules.)
  • Krzysztof Kieslowski (Polish-born director nominated for French-language film )
  • Michael Radford (an English-born director nominated for the Italian-language film Il Postino.
  • Roberto Benigni (Italian)
  • Ang Lee (Taiwanese-born director nominated for the Mandarin-language film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. He would later win for the English-language film Brokeback Mountain.)
  • Fernando Meirelles (Brazilian Portuguese)
  • Clint Eastwood (an American director nominated for the Japanese-language film Letters from Iwo Jima, which has a few brief scenes in English).
  • Julian Schnabel (an American director nominated for the French-language film The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.)

Ironically, internationally known filmmakers Jean Renoir (for The Southerner), Michelangelo Antonioni (for Blowup) and Louis Malle (for Atlantic City) were nominated for films that were in English and not their native language.

Nominations for films primarily in English with some scenes (of a notable length) in a foreign language includes:

Several international nominees (regardless of the language used in their respective films) include:

See also

External links

References

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