| |
|
David Fincher |
|
Director |
 |
|
1962 - |
|
Born August 28,
Denver, Colorado, USA |
|
Key
Production Country: USA |
|
Key Genres:
Thriller, Police Detective Film, Psychological Thriller, Psychological
Drama |
|
Key Collaborators: Cean
Chaffin (Producer), James Haygood (Editor), Angus Wall (Editor), Howard Shore (Composer), Brad
Pitt (Leading Player), Jared Leto (Leading Character Player), Darius
Khondji (Cinematographer), Harris Savides (Cinematographer), Jeff
Cronenweth (Cinematographer), Arthur Max (Production Designer) |
|
|
Highly
Recommended: Se7en
(1995)* |
|
Recommended:
The
Game (1997) |
|
Worth
a Look:
Alien³ (1992), Panic
Room (2002), Zodiac (2007)^, The Social Network (2010)^ |
|
Approach with Caution:
Fight Club (1999)* |
|
* Listed in TSPDT's
1,000 Greatest Films
section; ^
Listed in TSPDT's
21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films
section. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
Links: [
Amazon
] [
IMDB ] [
TCMDB ] [
All-Movie
Guide ] [
Senses
of Cinema: Great Directors ]
[
Film Reference ]
[
Wikipedia ] [
DVD Talk Interview ] [
The Works and Genius of
David Fincher ] [
Pop Matters Article (2007)]
[
Digital Bits Interview ] [
Brainy Quotes ] [
Scotsman Interview (2008) ]
[
Flickering Myth Profile ] |
|
Books:
[
David Fincher: Films That Scar ] [
Dark Eye: The Films of David Fincher
] |
|
|
    |
| |
| |
|
|
| |
"It's
to David Fincher's credit that his films take place somewhere
beyond our edge - yet in a recognizable extension of our
nightmares. As such, he has an interest in film noir, science
fiction, and a kind of sardonic speculation, plus the ability to
cross over from one to another."
-
David
Thomson (The New Biographical Dictionary of Film, 2002) |
|
| |
|
|
| |
"There is always a
tendency toward flashy technique in Fincher's output. While
impressive, it can add up to genius, as in Fight Club, or
echo emptily, as in Panic Room. A matter of subjective
perception, yes, but the brilliance is in manipulating movie
form and technology to tell stories filled with nihilism and
violence, which nevertheless describe a journey to redemption." -
Garrett Chaffin-Quiray (501 Movie Directors: A Comprehensive Guide to the Greatest
Filmmakers, 2007) |
|
| |
|
|
| |
"One
of the more accomplished directors to have emerged from the
field of music video, David Fincher has thus far demonstrated a
striking consistency of vision. Notable for their focus on
dystopian despair, social decay and moral breakdown, his films
are equally distinctive through their thoroughly postmodern
cynicism. This is complemented by a recurring commitment to
striking formal and stylistic design which frame the films'
thematic resonances in an often stunning visual schemata." -
Neil Jackson and Ian Haydn Smith (Contemporary North American Film Directors, 2002)
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
"Directing ain't about drawing a neat little picture and showing
it to the cameraman. I didn't want to go to film school. I
didn't know what the point was. The fact is, you don't know what
directing is until the sun is setting and you've got to get five
shots and you're only going to get two." -
David Fincher |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Please
note that the rating given for this director (see top-right) is based
only on the films we have seen (listed above). Films by this director
that we haven't seen include The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008). |
|
|
|
7- |
| |
|
"David
Fincher is a devotee of darkness. Scene after scene in his
films takes place in cramped, sparsely lit rooms where
malignancy seems to hang in the air like ineradicable damp.
For the shadows that pervade his films are moral and
psychological no less than physical. Using darkness as a
metaphor for evil and danger is hardly original—it is the
entire basis of film noir, for a start—but Fincher brings to
the banal equation a degree of emotional intensity that
reinvigorates it. The darkness in his films is organic, the
element in which his characters swim."
-
Philip Kemp, International Dictionary
of Film and Filmmakers |
| |
 |
| |
|
●
Top 250 Directors |
|
●
21st Century Top
50 |
|
●
Ranked
39th on The Guardian's 2004 List of the World's 40 Best Directors |
|
●
Ranked 25th on Film Comment's list of the 25 Best
Directors of the Decade (2000-2009) |
|
●
501 Movie Directors: A
Comprehensive Guide to the Greatest Filmmakers |
|
|
|
See Also |
|
●
Danny Boyle |
|
●
Francis Ford Coppola |
|
●
David Cronenberg |
|
●
Jonathan Demme |
|
●
John Frankenheimer |
|
●
Stanley
Kubrick |
|
●
Kiyoshi Kurosawa |
|
●
Michael Mann |
|
●
James Marsh |
|
●
Phillip Noyce |
|
●
Martin Scorsese |
|
●
Ridley Scott |
| |
|
David Fincher's Favourites |
|
Alien (1979)
Ridley Scott,
All That Jazz (1979)
Bob Fosse,
All the President's Men (1976)
Alan J. Pakula,
American Graffiti (1973)
George Lucas,
Being There (1979)
Hal Ashby,
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
George Roy Hill,
Cabaret (1972)
Bob Fosse,
Chinatown (1974)
Roman Polanski,
Citizen Kane (1941)
Orson Welles,
Days of Heaven (1978)
Terrence Malick,
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the
Bomb (1964)
Stanley Kubrick,
8½ (1963)
Federico Fellini,
The Exorcist (1973)
William Friedkin,
The Godfather Part II (1974)
Francis Ford
Coppola,
The Graduate (1967)
Mike Nichols,
Jaws (1975)
Steven Spielberg,
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
David Lean,
Mad Max 2 (1981)
George Miller,
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
Terry Jones &
Terry Gilliam,
National Lampoon's Animal House (1978)
John Landis,
Paper Moon (1973)
Peter Bogdanovich,
Rear Window (1954) Alfred
Hitchcock,
Taxi Driver (1976)
Martin Scorsese,
The Terminator (1984)
James Cameron,
The Year of Living Dangerously (1983)
Peter Weir,
Zelig (1983)
Woody Allen.
Source:
Empire (2008) |
| |
|
|
|
|