1980s

Year	Winner	Director(s)
1980	Apocalypse Now Apocalypse Now Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American war film set during the Vietnam War, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The central character is US Army special operations officer Captain Benjamin L. Willard , of MACV-SOG, an assassin sent to kill the renegade and presumed insane Special Forces...	Francis Ford Coppola Francis Ford Coppola Francis Ford Coppola is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. He is widely acclaimed as one of Hollywood's most innovative and influential film directors...
1981	Chariots of Fire Chariots of Fire Chariots of Fire is a 1981 British film. It tells the fact-based story of two athletes in the 1924 Olympics: Eric Liddell, a devout Scottish Christian who runs for the glory of God, and Harold Abrahams, an English Jew who runs to overcome prejudice....	Hugh Hudson Hugh Hudson Hugh Hudson is an English film director. His best-known international success is the 1981 multiple Academy Award-winning film, Chariots of Fire.- Early life :...
1982	Missing Missing (film) Missing is a 1982 American drama film directed by Costa Gavras, and starring Jack Lemmon, Sissy Spacek, Melanie Mayron, John Shea, Charles Cioffi and Janice Rule...	Costa-Gavras Costa-Gavras Costa-Gavras, is a Greek filmmaker, who lives and works in France, best known for films with overt political themes, most famously the fast-paced thriller, Z...
1983	The King of Comedy The King of Comedy (1983 film) The King of Comedy is a 1983 American dark comedy film starring Robert De Niro and Jerry Lewis, and directed by Martin Scorsese. The subject of the movie is celebrity stalking...	Martin Scorsese Martin Scorsese Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
1984	Paris, Texas Paris, Texas (film) Paris, Texas is a 1984 drama film directed by Wim Wenders. The screenplay is by L.M. Kit Carson and playwright Sam Shepard, and the distinctive musical score was composed by Ry Cooder. The cinematography is by Robby Müller....	Wim Wenders Wim Wenders Ernst Wilhelm "Wim" Wenders is a German film director, playwright, author, photographer and producer.-Early life:Wenders was born in Düsseldorf. He graduated from high school in Oberhausen in the Ruhr area. He then studied medicine and philosophy in Freiburg and Düsseldorf...
1985	The Purple Rose of Cairo The Purple Rose of Cairo The Purple Rose of Cairo is a 1985 American comedy-drama film written and directed by Woody Allen. Inspired by Sherlock, Jr., Hellzapoppin, and Pirandello's Six Characters in Search of an Author, it is the tale of a film character who leaves a fictional film of the same name and enters the real...	Woody Allen Woody Allen Woody Allen is an American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, jazz musician, author, and playwright. Allen's films draw heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Jewish identity, and the history of cinema...
1986	A Room with a View A Room with a View A Room with a View is a 1908 novel by English writer E. M. Forster, about a young woman in the repressed culture of Edwardian England. Set in Italy and England, the story is both a romance and a critique of English society at the beginning of the 20th century...	James Ivory James Ivory (director) James Francis Ivory is an American film director, best known for the results of his long collaboration with Merchant Ivory Productions, which included both Indian-born film producer Ismail Merchant, and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala...
1987	Hope and Glory	John Boorman John Boorman John Boorman is a British filmmaker who is a long time resident of Ireland and is best known for his feature films such as Point Blank, Deliverance, Zardoz, Excalibur, The Emerald Forest, Hope and Glory, The General and The Tailor of Panama.-Early life:Boorman was born in Shepperton, Surrey,...
1988	House of Games House of Games House of Games is David Mamet's 1987 film directorial debut. Mamet wrote the screenplay himself, from a story he devised with Jonathan Katz. The film's cast includes Lindsay Crouse, Joe Mantegna, Ricky Jay, and J. T. Walsh.-Plot:...	David Mamet David Mamet David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director.Best known as a playwright, Mamet won a Pulitzer Prize and received a Tony nomination for Glengarry Glen Ross . He also received a Tony nomination for Speed-the-Plow . As a screenwriter, he received Oscar...
1989	Distant Voices, Still Lives Distant Voices, Still Lives Distant Voices, Still Lives is a 1988 British film directed and written by Terence Davies. It evokes working-class family life in Liverpool during the 1940s and early 1950s, paying particular attention to the role of popular music, Hollywood cinema, light entertainment, and the public house within...	Terence Davies

1990s

Year	Winner	Director(s)
1990	Crimes and Misdemeanors Crimes and Misdemeanors Crimes and Misdemeanors is a 1989 black comedy written, directed by and co-starring Woody Allen, alongside Martin Landau, Mia Farrow, Anjelica Huston, Jerry Orbach, Alan Alda, Sam Waterston and Joanna Gleason....	Woody Allen Woody Allen Woody Allen is an American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, jazz musician, author, and playwright. Allen's films draw heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Jewish identity, and the history of cinema...
1991	Thelma & Louise	Ridley Scott Ridley Scott Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
1992	Unforgiven Unforgiven Unforgiven is a 1992 American Western film produced and directed by Clint Eastwood with a screenplay written by David Webb Peoples. The film tells the story of William Munny, an aging outlaw and killer who takes on one more job years after he had hung up his guns and turned to farming...	Clint Eastwood Clint Eastwood Clinton "Clint" Eastwood, Jr. is an American film actor, director, producer, composer and politician. Eastwood first came to prominence as a supporting cast member in the TV series Rawhide...
1993	The Piano The Piano The Piano is a 1993 New Zealand drama film about a mute pianist and her daughter, set during the mid-19th century in a rainy, muddy frontier backwater on the west coast of New Zealand. The film was written and directed by Jane Campion, and stars Holly Hunter, Harvey Keitel, Sam Neill, and Anna Paquin...	Jane Campion Jane Campion Jane Campion is a filmmaker and screenwriter. She is one of the most internationally successful New Zealand directors, although most of her work has been made in or financed by other countries, principally Australia – where she now lives – and the United States...
1994	Schindler's List Schindler's List Schindler's List is a 1993 American film about Oskar Schindler, a German businessman who saved the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees during the Holocaust by employing them in his factories. The film was directed by Steven Spielberg, and based on the novel Schindler's Ark...	Steven Spielberg Steven Spielberg Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
1995	Babe Babe (film) Babe is a 1995 Australian-American film directed by Chris Noonan. It is an adaptation of the 1983 novel The Sheep-Pig, also known as Babe: The Gallant Pig in the United States, by Dick King-Smith and tells the story of a pig who wants to be a sheepdog...	Chris Noonan Chris Noonan Chris Noonan is a Sydney-based Australian filmmaker and actor best known for the pioneering live-action / CG film Babe, for which he received Academy Award nominations as both director and writer.-Biography:...
1996	Fargo Fargo (film) Fargo is a 1996 American dark comedy-crime film produced, directed and written by brothers Joel and Ethan Coen. It stars Frances McDormand as a pregnant police chief who investigates a series of homicides, William H...	Joel Coen
1997	L.A. Confidential L.A. Confidential (film) L.A. Confidential is a 1997 American film based on James Ellroy's 1990 novel of the same title, the third book in his L.A. Quartet. Both the book and the film tell the story of a group of LAPD officers in the 1950s, and the intersection of police corruption and Hollywood celebrity...	Curtis Hanson Curtis Hanson Curtis Lee Hanson is an American film director, film producer and screenwriter. His directing work includes The Hand That Rocks the Cradle , L.A...
1998	Saving Private Ryan Saving Private Ryan Saving Private Ryan is a 1998 American war film set during the invasion of Normandy in World War II. It was directed by Steven Spielberg, with a screenplay by Robert Rodat. The film is notable for the intensity of its opening 27 minutes, which depicts the Omaha Beach assault of June 6, 1944....	Steven Spielberg Steven Spielberg Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
1999	American Beauty American Beauty (film) American Beauty is a 1999 American drama film directed by Sam Mendes and written by Alan Ball. Kevin Spacey stars as Lester Burnham, a middle-aged magazine writer who has a midlife crisis when he becomes infatuated with his teenage daughter's best friend, Angela...	Sam Mendes Sam Mendes Samuel Alexander "Sam" Mendes, CBE is an English stage and film director. He is best known for his Academy Award-winning work on his debut film American Beauty and his dark re-inventions of the stage musicals Cabaret , Oliver! , Company and Gypsy . He's currently working on the 23rd James Bond...

2000s

{| class="wikitable" width="95%" cellpadding="5"
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!width="100"|Year
!width="450"|Winner
!width="450"|Director(s)
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|style="text-align:center;"|2000 || Being John Malkovich

Being John Malkovich

Being John Malkovich is a 1999 American black comedy-fantasy film written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Spike Jonze. It stars John Cusack, Cameron Diaz, Catherine Keener, and John Malkovich, who plays a fictional version of himself...

|| Spike Jonze

Spike Jonze

Spike Jonze is an American director, producer and actor, whose work includes music videos, commercials, film and television...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2001 || Moulin Rouge!

Moulin Rouge!

Moulin Rouge! is a 2001 romantic jukebox musical film directed, produced, and co-written by Baz Luhrmann. Following the Red Curtain Cinema principles, the film is based on the Orphean myth, La Traviata, and La Bohème...

|| Baz Luhrmann

Baz Luhrmann

Mark Anthony "Baz" Luhrmann is an Australian film director, screenwriter, and producer best known for The Red Curtain Trilogy, which includes his films Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2002 || About Schmidt

About Schmidt

About Schmidt is a 2002 American comedy-drama film directed by Alexander Payne, starring Jack Nicholson in the title role. It is loosely based on the 1996 novel of the same title by Louis Begley. Many of the scenes were filmed on location, especially in Omaha, Nebraska and Denver, Colorado...

|| Alexander Payne

Alexander Payne

Alexander Payne, born Alexander Constantine Papadopoulos is an American film director and screenwriter. His films are noted for their dark humor and satirical depictions of contemporary American society.- Early life :...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2003 || Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World is a 2003 film directed by Peter Weir, starring Russell Crowe as Jack Aubrey, with Paul Bettany as Stephen Maturin and released by 20th Century Fox, Miramax Films and Universal Studios...

|| Peter Weir

Peter Weir

Peter Lindsay Weir, AM is an Australian film director. After playing a leading role in the Australian New Wave cinema with his films such as Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Last Wave and Gallipoli, Weir directed a diverse group of American and international films—many of them major box office...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2004 || Sideways || Alexander Payne

Alexander Payne

Alexander Payne, born Alexander Constantine Papadopoulos is an American film director and screenwriter. His films are noted for their dark humor and satirical depictions of contemporary American society.- Early life :...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2005 || Brokeback Mountain

Brokeback Mountain

Brokeback Mountain is a 2005 romantic drama film directed by Ang Lee. It is a film adaptation of the 1997 short story of the same name by Annie Proulx with the screenplay written by Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry...

|| Ang Lee

Ang Lee

Ang Lee is a Taiwanese film director. Lee has directed a diverse set of films such as Eat Drink Man Woman , Sense and Sensibility , Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon , Hulk , and Brokeback Mountain , for which he won an Academy...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2006 || United 93

United 93 (film)

United 93 is a 2006 fact-based historical drama film written, co-produced, and directed by Paul Greengrass that chronicles events aboard United Airlines Flight 93, which was hijacked during the September 11 attacks...

|| Paul Greengrass

Paul Greengrass

Paul Greengrass is an English film director, screenwriter and former journalist. He specialises in dramatisations of real-life events and is known for his signature use of hand-held cameras.-Life and career:...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2007 || No Country for Old Men

No Country for Old Men (film)

No Country for Old Men is a 2007 American crime thriller directed by Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, and starring Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, and Josh Brolin. The film was adapted from the Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name...

|| Joel and Ethan Coen

Coen Brothers

Joel David Coen and Ethan Jesse Coen known together professionally as the Coen brothers, are American filmmakers...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2008 || The Wrestler || Darren Aronofsky

Darren Aronofsky

Darren Aronofsky is an American film director, screenwriter and film producer. He attended Harvard University to study film theory and the American Film Institute to study both live-action and animation filmmaking...

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|style="text-align:center;"|2009 || A Prophet (Un prophète)

A Prophet

A Prophet is a 2009 French prison film directed by Jacques Audiard. Audiard claims that the film aims at "creating icons, images for people who don't have images in movies, like the Arabs in France," though he also had stated that the film "has nothing to do with his vision of society," and is a...

|| Jacques Audiard

Jacques Audiard

Jacques Audiard is a French film director, the son of Michel Audiard, also a notable screenwriter and film director.He won twice both the César Award for Best Film and the BAFTA Award for Best Film not in the English Language, in 2005 for The Beat That My Heart Skipped and in 2010 for A Prophet...

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