Director Showdown – Round 1, Match 9 – Marielle Heller vs. Guy Ritchie
January 28, 2026
We’re back with some new films, a new guest, and a new episode of Director Showdown! In this series, we pit 64 of the biggest directors to debut since 1998 against each other in a head-to-head tournament to determine the greatest director of the last 28 years!
In the last episode, occasional Oscar rivals Bong Joon-ho and Adam McKay faced off with two films about classism and economic collapse. In the battle between Snowpiercer and The Big Short, McKay narrowly snatched victory, defeating his quadruple-Oscar winning opponent!
Speaking of snatching things… this week we’re talking about heists!
Sort of!
First on the ticket is a director prizing quality over quantity. Despite a filmography of only 4 films, Marielle Heller has made a name for herself with high-profile, buzzy titles that always get at least a little awards attention. Her film Nightbitch got Amy Adams a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress – Musical or Comedy, her film A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood got Tom Hanks an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. The film we’re talking about today, Can You Ever Forgive Me? netted Academy Award nominations for both of its main stars, Richard E Grant for Best Supporting Actor, and Melissa McCarthy for Best Lead Actress, as well as a Best Adapted Screenplay nomination for writers Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty.
Can You Ever Forgive Me? is of course a biopic about Lee Israel, a biographer who in the 90s became infamous for forging literary letters in the style of authors such as Noël Coward, Fanny Brice, and Ernest Hemingway. McCarthy plays Israel in perhaps her greatest role to date, bringing just the right mix of misanthropy and charm to really centre this fusion of a biopic and a crime thriller.
Heller’s opponent is the ever-illustrious Guy Ritchie! Coming up alongside Matthew Vaughn in the early 2000s, Ritchie would make a name for himself with films like Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, and later the Sherlock Holmes series starring Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law. He’s also the director who gave audiences their first taste of Jason Statham, who has himself become an institution in the 25+ years since his breakout role in Lock.
Ritchie’s followup to Lock would be the riotous ensemble heist film Snatch, about two boxing promoters who get in over their head at the same time as a group of small time criminals get their hands on a rare diamond. Those two plots, initially unrelated, intertwine in hilarious, almost Looney Tunes-esque ways as each group repeatedly fail their way upwards. Starring Statham alongside Brad Pitt, Stephen Graham, and Lennie James as everyone’s favourite character Sol, Snatch has stood the test of time to become regarded as one of Ritchie’s best films, as well as one of the most popular in each of the aforementioned actors’ filmographies.
(Editor’s Note: Jeff claims repeatedly in this episode that Sol is “the driver.” This is not true: in scenes featuring Sol and his gang driving, Sol sits next to the driver)
Joining us today is a guest last heard on our 2025 Year In Review episode, and before that Kickin’ It With Kendrick, Episode 3: The Twilight Saga. That’s right, Kylie from the Academy of Death Racers is back! Like all our guests, Kylie has a bit of a bias towards one of our competing films. Can you guess what it is before she tells you? And will Kylie’s favourite come out on top? Tune in to find out in today’s episode of 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.
Special thanks this week to our good friend Cris, who made the cover art for this episode! Follow her on Instagram, Twitter, and Letterboxd to see more of her artwork, film opinions/reviews, or both!
