12 film personalities who will change your movie taste for sure

Till 2010 my taste for movies included trashy flicks which were filled with nonsense story lines, unbelievably stupid action scenes and unnecessary plus useless love story angles, but then I came across the works of few film personalities which include directors and actors from Hollywood, Bollywood and even Tollywood (bengali films) which actually made me believe that what all I was following before were simply the different faces of utter nonsense. Directors and scriptwriters changed my taste with their creative mantras which had their own originality and actors did it not only with their magnificent acting skills but also by choosing the right movies to star in. This list that I have prepared includes all of them but just a disclaimer; while preparing it I didn't had any sort of ranking for the arrangement, it’s just according to whoever flashed first in my mind.

1) Quentin Tarantino

Beginning with Reservoir Dogs  in 1992 he went on to make the best known crime movies like Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, Kill Bill vol. 1 and 2 and Death Proof to name a few which were successful both critically as well as commercially.  His fictional history film Inglorious Bastards starring Brad ?Pitt and Christoph Waltz was also a gem. He has recieved many industry awards including two Academy Awards for Pulp Fiction and Django Unchained both under the category of 'Best Original Screenplay' and two BAFTA awards for the same movies and under the same categories as mentioned.

2) Brian De Palma

Best known for suspense thrillers but when his name comes to my mind, I remember an evergreen classic of his i.e Scarface released in 1983 starring Al Pacino, it was a remake of 1932 film of the same name; it told the story of Tony Montana, a Cuban refugee who arrives in Miami with nothing and rises to become the most powerful drug kingpin. 

His other successful works include Carrie, Dressed to Kill, The Untouchables and Carlito's Way.

3) Anurag Kashyap

To be honest, I hate Bollywood, 80 % of the films produced in Bollywood are copied ones. The directors and scriptwriters don't have any original idea of their own and the rich producers love to drain their money into giving these directors the chance to create crap.
On this mud made of garbage films , if you are looking for a lotus, they are the Anurag Kashyap movies produced under two of his film banners, A K Films and Phantom. Acclaimed for making often realistic films and having newcomers in most of his movies he has earned a cut following. Almost all of his movies are worth watching but the memorable ones are Satya (1998) (for which he was only the scriptwriter, the film was directed by Ram Gopal Verma), Black Friday (2007), DevD (2009) - a modern adaptation of Devdas, Gulaal (2009) and the latest one Ugly (2014). His latest release is Bombay Velvet.

4) Al Pacino

Well known for playing mobsters and gangsters on screen, Al Pacino's acting got such strength that you will remember his portrayed characters more than him. Some of the best known classic characters are that of Michael Corleone in The Godfather, The Godfather 2 and The Godfather 3, Tony Montana in Scarface, Arthur Kirkland in ..And Justice for All  and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way. He also played biographical roles like that of Frank Serpico in Serpico (1973), Sonny Wortzick in Dog Day Afternoon (1975) and Benjamin "Lefty" Ruggiero in Donnie Brasco (1997). During his acting career he had been nominated 8 times for oscar out of which he won one, he won four Golden Globe and two BAFTA awards. 

5) Robert De Niro

After being turned down for the role of Sonny Corleone in The Godfather in 1972, he was chosen for the role of young Vito Corleone in The Godfather part II released in 1974. De Niro became the first actor to win an Academy award speaking mainly a foreign language. After gaining popularity for the role of a dying Major League Baseball player in Bang the Drums Slowly (1973) his collaboration with the renowned director Martin Scorcese started. Some of the most memorable characters for which I recommend him include that of a small time gangster Johny Boy in Mean Streets (1973),  Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver (1976), David Noodles Aaronson in Once upon a time in America (1984) and as Maximilian 'Max' Cady in Cape Fear (1991) etc. Just like Al Pacino he too has many biographical roles to his credit, most of them in Martin Scorcese films, the examples include boxer Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull (1980), Al Capone in The Untouchables (1987), James Conway in Goodfellas (1990) and Sam Ace Rothstein in Casino (1995).

6) Uttam Kumar

 

Regarded as one of the greatest actors in the history of Indian Cinema he was known by the honorific Mahanayak. Throughout his career he earned commercial as well as critical success and he remains a cultural icon. He managed to have a huge fan folowing mainy concentrated in the regions of XWest Bengal and Bangladesh. A metro station in Kolkata was renamed in his honor. His earlier movies were mostly flops and he was even dubbed as the 'Flop Master General'. He came to prominence after getting a contract with M P Studios for the film Basu Paribar but his breakthrough is considered to be the film Agni Pariksha in 1954. He mostly did commercial cinemas and that too mainly the romantic ones. His pairing up with Suchitra Sen (grandmother of Riya and Raima Sen) was so much applauded by audience that the term 'Uttam-Suchitra film' became enough adjective to attract viewers to theatres. Still my favorite Uttam Kumar starrer till date would be his movie with master filmmaker Satyajit Ray that is Nayok. This movie tells the story of a superstar who while travelling in a train to Delhi to recieve an award recounts about his own life, how he was an ordinary man doing theatres and then acted in movies much against his teacher's wishes and later on rose to be a superstar. The story was very much inspired by his own life, Satyajit Ray wrote the script of the movie keeping Uttam's character in mind.  Uttam Kumar died at the age of 53 on 24th July 1980 after suffering a heart attack while filming Ogo Bodhu Shundori.

7) Soumitra Chatterjee 

Another superstar of bengali cinema who had his own speciality, while Uttam Kumar is remembered for his evergreen commercial cinemas by the majority of audience, there was a target audience who had their eyes for art cinemas or parallel cinemas, Soumitra Chatterjee was their Nayak. After his debut in Apur Sansar in 1959, the third and the last installment of the magnificent Apu trilogy, he became a regular in Satyajit Ray films such as Abhijan in 1962, Charulata in 1964, Aranyer Din Ratri in 1969, Ashani Sanket in 1973, Sonar Kella in 1974, Joi baba Felunath in 1978, Ghare Baire in 1984 and Ganashatru in 1989. He worked with several other notable actors also of that era including Tapan Sinha in Kshudista Pashan in 1960 and Jhinder Bandi in 1984 and Mrinal Sen in Akash Kusum (1965). He is still an active actor in films.

8) Satyajit Ray

Drawn into making independent films after watching Vittorio De Sica's italian movie Bicycle Thieves, he made his first movie in 1955 namely Pather Panchali which won 11 international awards. For his film Ray did the scripting, casting, scoring, editing and designed his own credit titles and publicity materials. He did not only make movies, through his movies and short stories primarily aimed at children and adolescents, he created several iconic characters including the detective Feluda and  the scientist in his science fiction stories Professor Shonku. He was awarded an honorary degree by Oxford University. Ray recieved many major awards in his career including 32 Indian National film awards. In 1992 he was awarded an honorary Academy award. In the same year he was awarded Bharat Ratna by Government of India. 

9) Srijit Mukherjee

This director came into prominence after directing his first feature film Autograph released in 2010 which was a commercial as well as critical success. Till date he has made only six films which are Autograph, Baishe Srabon, Hemlock society, Mishawr Rawhoshyo, Jaatishwar and Chotushkone. \Out of these movies Jaatishwar which was a musical, won 4 national awards at India's 61st National Film Awards. Also he has won the National film award for best director and best original screenplay for his sixth film Chotushkone which was a psychological thriller. All his movies are worth watching except Mishawr Rawhoshyo. His next film is Nirbaak starring Sushmita Sen and Jishu Sen Gupta.

10) Martin Scorcese

But every director's movie is not perfect, sometimes you may feel monotonous at some parts of the movie. But this is rarely the case with Martin Scorcese. Starting with short films which had long names such as What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this? in 1963 he made his first full length movie Who's that knocking at my door which was a black and white film starring his fellow student Harvey Keitel. It was Brian De Palma who introduced him to Robert De Niro. During this year he worked as assistant director and one of the editors in the documentary Woodstock. In 1972 Scorcese made Boxcar Bertha for B movie producer Roger Corman. His next movie was Mean Streets starring Robert De Niro and Harvey Keitel followed by Alice Doesn't live here anymore in 1974 for which actress Ellen Berstyn chose Scorcese to direct her, she won an academy award for her role. Scorsese's body of work addresses such themes as Italian-American identity, concepts of guilt and redemption,machismo, modern crime, and gang conflict. Many of his films are also notable for their depiction of violence and liberal use of profanity. He has directed landmark films such as the vigilante-drama Taxi Driver (1976), the biographical sports drama Raging Bull (1980), the black comedy The King of Comedy(1983), and the crime film Goodfellas (1990), all of which he collaborated on with actor and close friend Robert De Niro. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for the crime drama The Departed (2006). With eight Best Director nominations to date, he is the most nominated living director, and is tied with Billy Wilder for the second most nominations overall. Since the epic historical drama Gangs of New York (2002), he has also been noted for his collaborations with Leonardo DiCaprio. 

11) Anjan Dutta

Before a director he is also a songwriter and a serious actor, his direction started in 1998 with the film Badadin in 1998 but one of his movies that is my favourite till date is The Bong Connection released in 2006 which talks of NRI bengalis and Indian bengalis and their different perspectives about each other. His notable films include Madly Bangalee, Byomkesh Bakshi, Ranjana Ami Ar Ashbona, Abar Byomkesh,Dutta vs Dutta and Byomkesh Phire Elo.

12) Rituparno Ghosh

Rituparno Ghosh was one of most acclaimed film directors of India, and was himself an admirer of Satyajit Ray. His films glorified womanhood and closely and sensitively portrayed women's lives, feelings and sufferings. According to Bollywood actor Anupam Kher, Ghosh had wonderful understanding of the female psyche. In his last films he addressed issues of homosexuality and gender.Ghosh was a researcher and admirer of Rabindranath Tagore. He made three films directly based on literary works of Rabindranath Tagore— Choker Bali (2003), Nokuadubi(2010) and Chitrangada (2012). In the film Asukh (1999) Tagore played an invisible role. In 2012, Ghosh made a documentary based on Tagore's autobiography, 'Jiban Smriti', for the Government of India Ministry of Culture. He has won many national film awards for his movies including Unishe April, Dahan, Asukh, Utsab, Shubho Mahurat, Chokher Bali, Raincoat, The Last Lear, Sob Choritro kalponik, Abohoman, Chitrangada. He had also won many film festival awards such as Golden Leopard award, Golden Crow Pheasent and Crystal Globe. He died on 30 May 2013 after a heart attack. In response to his death Amitabh Bachchan tweeted, "Ghosh was a sensitive artistic minded gentle human being".