Classic Movies Live – Season 4, Episode 42: Director Showdown Pilot
November 15, 2023
Welcome to Director Showdown! In this new series, we pit 64 of the biggest directors to debut since 1998 against each other in an elimination bracket to determine who will be crowned the greatest director of the last 25 years!
In each episode, we’ll examine thematically similar movies from two different directors, comparing how each tackles that week’s themes, as well as the achievements each filmmaker brings to their respective film. To start things off, Pierre and Jeff examine the nature of systemic corruption, as depicted in Antoine Fuqua’s Training Day and Pete Docter’s Monsters, Inc. Both movies were nominated for Academy Awards at the 74th ceremony, with Training Day earning Denzel Washington the Oscar for Best Actor. But only one movie can come out on top, and one director will end their journey with the show in the first round!
Join us as we debate Fuqua vs. Docter in the first ever Director Showdown!
This episode was inspired by Rotten Tomatoes’ Best Director Showdown, which was conducted among RT users over the summer of 2023. The results of that competition are summarized in this article.
