Name some successful directors that didn't go to film school

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Quentin Tarantino
Steven Soderbergh
John Sayles
Peter Jackson
Richard Linklater
John Landis
Luc Besson
Martin McDonagh
Terry Gilliam
Brad Anderson
Clint Eastwood
Ridley Scott
David Fincher
Luc Besson
Joe Carnahan
John Waters
Woody Allen
Peter Bogdanovich
David Cronenberg
John Cassavetes
Michael Apted
Sam Raimi
Paul Thomas Anderson (dropped out)
Kevin Smith (dropped out)
Whit Stillman
Guillermo del Toro
Robert Rodriguez
Jim Gillespie
Paul Haggis
Wes Craven
George Romero
Alfinso Cuaron
Shane Meadows
James Cameron
Shane Carruth

and Orson Welles did pretty good without ever going to film school.
 
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Adam Mckay
Trey Parker (Got kicked out due to not attending class because he was making his own movie)
Terry Jones
Harold Ramis
Wes Craven


I haven't heard of many successful film students, in general, really. I know there are some, but I can't think of any off the top of my head besides Ben Stiller.
 
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mussonman said:
I haven't heard of many successful film students, in general, really.
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George Lucas
Robert Zemeckis
Judd Apatow
Martin Scorsese
Oliver Stone
John Milius
Dan O’Bannon
James L. Brooks
John Carpenter
Nick Castle
Sam Peckinpaw (was a Drama major)
Bryan Singer
Alex Cox
John Singleton
Martin Brest
Amy Heckerling
Jim Jarmusch
Paul Bartel
Joel Coen
Penelope Spheeris
Tom Shadyac
Francis Coppola
Shane Black
Spike Lee
Marc Forster
Ron Howard
 
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Get a half-way decent actors, a damn good crew, state-of-the-art equipment, choose your locations wisely, plan your shots and it doesn't much make a difference what you did before.
Always keep your fingers crossed that everything turns out as well as hoped/in your mind's eye.
 
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Directorik: Just noticed from your first list that Luc Besson didn't go to film school, twice. Do you think that affected his style any or would he be making the same sort of films if he had only not gone to film school once? :redgrin:

G
 
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mussonman said:
I haven't heard of many successful film students, in general, really. I know there are some, but I can't think of any off the top of my head besides Ben Stiller.
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Just the Cinematographers I can think of off the top of my head who went to film school....

Roger Deakins
Jeff Cronenweth
Janusz Kaminski
Caleb Deschanel
William Fraker
Conrad Hall
Wally Pfister
Andrew Lesnie
Dion Beebe
Robert Richardson
John Schwartzman
Robert Elswit
Matthew Libatique

Other successful film professionals who went to film school (apart from those already mentioned by directorik) include:
Darren Aronofsky
Terrence Malick
Gore Verbinski
Brad Siberling
Lee Unkrich
Tim Burton
Robert Luketic
etc.
 
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mussonman said:
I haven't heard of many successful film students, in general, really. I know there are some, but I can't think of any off the top of my head besides Ben Stiller.
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I may be wrong, but I remember hearing Ben Stiller on Howard's Stern's radio show, and he talked about having never gone to film school. I haven't checked online to see who's correct, but that's what I remember.
 
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