100 best directors of the last 25 years, according to thousands of critics

Only six female directors feature on the list

A new study has revealed Richard Linklater to apparently be the greatest director of the last 25 years, closely followed by Mike Leigh and Jafar Panahi.

Quartz analysed data from Metacritic, the film reviews aggregation website, using the website’s scores out of 100 to judge who the top directors are.

The publication looked at every director who has released over six films in the last 25 years (sorry, Damien Chazelle), and worked out the average score for their top six films.

Linklater claimed the top spot with an average 88.5 score for his top six films, which included the perfect scoring Boyhood, Before Midnight, Before Sunset, 2016 hit Everybody Wants Some!!, The School of Rock and Waking Life. Notable omissions include Dazed and Confused and Before Sunrise.

Other directors who appear in the top 100 list include The Coen Brothers (84.7), Steven Spielberg (82.3) and Martin Scorsese (81.7). Due to the nature of Metacritics, which includes primarily America critics, the list segues more towards American directors.

Startlingly, only six women feature on the list: Claire Denis, Susanne Bier, Liz Garbus, Anne Fontaine, Lone Scherfig, and Catherine Breillat. Further proof Hollywood is still a predominantly boys-only club. You can read the whole list, compiled by Quartz below.

1 Richard Linklater 88.5

2 Mike Leigh 85.7

3 Jafar Panahi 85.5

4 Jean-Pierre Dardenne 85.2

5 The Coen Brothers 84.7

6 Hirokazu Koreeda 83.2

7 Steven Spielberg 82.3

8 Martin Scorsese 81.7

9 Pedro Almodavar 81.5

10 Werner Herzog 81.5

11 Paul Thomas Anderson 80.8

12 Michael Haneke 80.5

13 Clint Eastwood 80.3

14 Steven Soderbergh 80.3

15 Olivier Assayas 80.0

16 Peter Jackson 80.0

17 David O. Russell 79.8

18 Spike Lee 79.2

19 Quentin Tarantino 78.8

20 Michael Winterbottom 78.5

21 Alex Gibney 78.3

22 Stephen Frears 78.3

23 Yimou Zhang 78.2

24 Jia Zhangke 78.2

25 Noah Baumbach 77.8

26 Ridley Scott 77.8

27 Christopher Nolan 77.7

28 Jonathan Demme 77.7

29 Wes Anderson 77.5

30 Guillermo del Toro 77.0

31 Ang Lee 76.8

32 Danny Boyle 76.8

33 David Fincher 76.5

34 David Cronenberg 76.2

35 Kevin Macdonald 76.2

36 Errol Morris 76.0

37 Kar-Wai Wong 75.5

38 Jim Jarmusch 75.3

39 Paul Greengrass 75.3

40 Robert Altman 74.7

41 Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu 74.5

42 Ron Howard 74.2

43 Andre Techine 74.0

44 Denis Villeneuve 74.0

45 Francois Ozon 73.8

46 Ken Loach 73.8

47 Woody Allen 73.3

48 Fatih Akin 73.2

49 Catherine Breillat 72.8

50 Claire Denis 72.5

51 Roger Michell 72.5

52 Bruno Dumont 72.3

53 Nicolas Winding Refn 72.0

54 Tim Burton 72.0

55 Claude Chabrol 71.8

56 David Gordon Green 71.8

57 Michel Gondry 71.8

58 Roman Polanski 71.8

59 Chan-wook Park 71.7

60 Ki-duk Kim 71.5

61 Kirby Dick 71.5

62 Michael Apted 71.0

63 Robert Zemeckis 70.7

64 Michael Mann 70.5

65 Terrence Malick 70.0

66 Darren Aronofsky 69.8

67 David Mamet 69.8

68 Susanne Bier 69.8

69 Kiyoshi Kurosawa 69.7

70 Liz Garbus 69.7

71 Todd Solondz 69.7

72 Jon Favreau 69.5

73 Sam Raimi 69.3

74 Neil Jordan 69.0

75 John Madden 68.7

76 Johnnie To 68.7

77 Lars von Trier 68.7

78 Bryan Singer 68.5

79 David Yates 68.5

80 James Mangold 68.5

81 Michael Almereyda 68.3

82 Shane Meadows 68.3

83 Jean-Pierre Jeunet 68.2

84 Raymond De Felitta 67.8

85 Ben Wheatley 67.7

86 Doug Liman 67.7

87 Walter Salles 67.7

88 Ulrich Seidl 67.5

89 Carl Franklin 67.3

90 David Mackenzie 67.3

91 Alastair Fothergill 66.8

92 Anne Fontaine 66.7

93 Lone Scherfig 66.5

94 Sam Mendes 66.3

95 Bill Condon 66.2

96 Jason Reitman 66.0

97 Mike Newell 65.8

98 Patrice Leconte 65.8

99 Curtis Hanson 65.7

100 Michael Moore 65.7