Top 10 Underappreciated Directorial Debuts You Need To See

Not everyone creates a Citizen Kane on their first attempt. Before crafting bona fide classics, all directors must start somewhere. Some of the greatest struggled for years before producing a masterpiece, while others delivered gems right from the start.

The following ten films are a mix of both. Although these directors might not have been at the peak of their talents, their early movies still stand out among their best work. These films affirm the saying: If at first, you don’t succeed, try, try again.

10. Bad Taste (1987)

Director: Peter Jackson

With The Lord of the Rings franchise, Peter Jackson became a modern master of fantasy. His films rendered J.R.R. Tolkien’s mythic story with remarkable attention to detail. However, on a fraction of the Rings budget, Jackson told another equally entertaining story.

Bad Taste is a schlocky science fiction movie. A group of aliens invades New Zealand to harvest humans as meat for an intergalactic fast-food franchise. Made for only $25,000, the film economized by casting Jackson and his friends as most of the characters.

The remaining funds were dedicated to hilarious displays of body horror, featuring chunks of brains and exploding intestines with slapstick-like glee.

Bad Taste isn’t a profound film. It’s mostly about reveling in destroying man-eating aliens with chainsaws or rocket launchers. Yet, there’s a certain charm to that kind of B-movie nonsense.

9. This Is The Life (2008)

Director: Ava DuVernay

Ava DuVernay’s movies are always grounded in reality. With Selma, When They See Us, and 13th, DuVernay has consistently drawn upon African-American history to find compelling stories. This instinct was first honed in This Is the Life.

This Is the Life suggests that hip-hop almost entirely evolved from one building, Los Angeles’ Good Life Cafe (aka Good Life Health Food Centre). Before becoming a director, DuVernay regularly attended the cafe’s open mic sessions, mingling with many burgeoning rappers.

In the early 1990s, future stars like Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, will.i.am, Common, and Lenny Kravitz sharpened their skills at these open mics. The venue provided these talents with an outlet to hone their skills. Told from the perspective of someone who witnessed it firsthand, the documentary is a personal recollection of one of the most important artistic explosions of the late 20th century.

8. Pushing Hands (1991)

Director: Ang Lee

In the West, Ang Lee is best known for spectacle. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Hulk; and Life of Pi were visually transformative movies that pushed the boundaries of special effects. Yet, Ang Lee prefers his earlier, more intimate work in Taiwan. In their own way, those films are just as impactful.

Pushing Hands was co-written with Ang’s regular partner, James Schamus. The film deals with the central question in many of Ang Lee’s future projects—the conflict between family and duty.

In Pushing Hands, Sihung Lung plays Mr. Chu, a retired tai chi master. He and his son, Alex (Bo Z. Wang), leave China for America. In a classic fish-out-of-water story, the traditional Chinese father struggles to adjust to American life, creating a wedge in the family. The son is torn between his duties to his father and his wife (Deb Snyder).

Lee’s deft handling prevents the nuanced story from becoming a caricature. Comedic moments are undercut with legitimately harrowing scenes. It is a touching meditation on what we owe to each other.

Lee and Sihung Lung further explored this theme in later films, The Wedding Banquet and Eat Drink Man Woman. These three films make up the pseudo trilogy, Father Knows Best.

7. Hard Eight (1996)

Director: Paul Thomas Anderson

Among all of Paul Thomas Anderson’s movies, Hard Eight is distinct. It is the only one that feels like it could have been made by somebody else. Even amidst the wave of thrillers that exploded in the 1990s, Hard Eight still stands as a dark portrait of the follies of gambling. Beyond being a tightly told story of the corrosive nature of greed, the movie showcases the director trying to discover his voice.

In Hard Eight, Anderson honed many of the elements that would define his later films. Calling cards like narrative twists, idiosyncratic characters, and the cruelty of coincidence first emerged.

The movie featured three actors with whom Anderson would work for most of his career. The bulk of the story follows Philip Baker Hall as Sydney, a gambler in his sixties, and John C. Reilly as John, Sydney’s protégé. Philip Seymour Hoffman, another of Anderson’s muses, makes a brief appearance.

Hard Eight also launched the partnership of Anderson mainstays Robert Elswit and Jon Brion behind the camera. For both the characters and the director, Hard Eight was a movie about finding identity. Within a few years, Anderson had embarked on one of the most unique filmographies of the millennium.

6. I Wanna Hold Your Hand (1978)

Director: Robert Zemeckis

Universal Pictures didn’t want Robert Zemeckis to make this movie. The 26-year-old upstart only got the job because Hollywood’s wunderkind, Steven Spielberg, believed in him. Spielberg assuaged the studio’s fears by promising to take over directing if Zemeckis stumbled. Spielberg never got the chance.

Instead, Zemeckis landed on the winning formula of his career: nostalgia.

Like Marty McFly in Back to the Future or Forrest Gump in the eponymous movie, the characters in I Wanna Hold Your Hand serendipitously shape some of the greatest moments in history. The movie follows a group of six New Jersey teenagers as they try to score tickets to The Beatles’ imminent debut on The Ed Sullivan Show.

Enraptured by the band, the gang goes to absurd lengths to see their idols. The film toys with the truth to a hilarious degree. As with Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Zemeckis turned a love letter to icons of 20th-century pop culture into a delightful romp. Though the director achieved greater success later, his first film remains his most unabashedly earnest tribute to the past.

5. Medicine For Melancholy (2008)

Director: Barry Jenkins

Ostensibly, Medicine For Melancholy is a romance. Following two potential suitors walking around town after a one-night stand, the film argues that love can blossom from a single encounter.

However, this isn’t a traditional meet-cute. By the movie’s end, there’s no guarantee that the couple will ever see each other again, let alone run off together. The whole film simply presents two people enjoying each other’s company while unsure of what will happen next.

Genre limitations never undercut the broader themes of the work. Most of the film deals with the interplay between race and navigating the dating scene. Like the relationship itself, Medicine For Melancholy leaves many questions unresolved.

The movie works solely because it feels so genuine, practically natural. To much greater acclaim, Jenkins’s next film again struck the emotional balance between societal contemplations and budding love. That film, Moonlight, landed him a Best Picture win at the Oscars.

4. Targets (1968)

Director: Peter Bogdanovich

On a technical level, the first film directed by Peter Bogdanovich was Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women. However, the movie was so bad that Bogdanovich refused to put his name on it, hiding behind the pseudonym Derek Thomas. Instead, he decided that the first movie to bear his name would be Targets, and he made the right choice.

Targets is a fascinating harbinger of the future of horror and an ode to the genre’s past. In his last starring role, Boris Karloff is perfectly cast as an aging horror actor bemoaning the collapse of the traditional movie monster. This story is told parallel to Tim O’Kelly’s performance as a young man on a murderous spree with a rifle.

The two tales eventually converge as Karloff confronts the assassin at a drive-in theater that is screening one of his films. In the movie, Karloff is victorious. In reality, O’Kelly won in the long run.

Released in the aftermath of the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, the film initially flopped. In subsequent decades, it has been reappraised. Now, the film is celebrated as one of the earliest templates for the slasher trope that dominated horror in the years to come.

3. They Live By Night (1948)

Director: Nicholas Ray

It takes a certain level of talent to create a new genre on your first try. Though firmly indebted to noir, They Live by Night is now seen as a precursor to the trope of two lovers on the run.

Based on Edward Anderson’s novel Thieves Like Us, the movie introduced the now-familiar trope of an innocent woman (Cathy O’Donnell) enticed into the criminal lifestyle by a seductive fugitive (Farley Granger). The film’s structure directly inspired Arthur Penn’s innovative Bonnie and Clyde in 1967 and Robert Altman’s Thieves Like Us in 1974. Altman’s film was also based on Anderson’s book.

Even if it didn’t result in legions of imitators, They Live By Night remains a stirring meditation on life on the edge. Instead of over-the-top bloodshed, the film wallows in the existential dread of having no refuge. Seven years later, Ray’s allegiance to the misunderstood reached its apex with the immortally profound Rebel Without a Cause.

2. The Connection (1961)

Director: Shirley Clarke

Few movies have been as divisive upon release as The Connection. Everyone who saw it had a strong opinion. However, after two showings, police arrested the projectionist and shut down the theater. The Connection became infamous in art-house cinemas as one of the most forbidden films ever. By today’s standards, it is relatively tame.

The Connection shocked audiences with its subject matter and delivery. Based on the play of the same name by Jack Gelber, The Connection portrays a group of jazz musicians and drug addicts as they monologue while waiting for their latest fix.

Frank about the perils of heroin abuse, the movie was filled with profanity, which was considered Clarke’s most scandalous decision by early 1960s standards. Equally innovative, the jazz soundtrack captured the emotion of the kinetic, avant-garde storytelling. Only a handful of people saw the movie upon release, and they credit it as one of the most influential movies of all time.

1. Ascenseur Pour L’echafaud (1958)

Director: Louis Malle

Ascenseur pour l’échafaud (Elevator to the Gallows) was the first crest of the French New Wave. All the key elements of the movement—convoluted plots, close-up cinematography, and tight editing—were pioneered by the 24-year-old Malle.

The story structure of teenage lovers and a perfect murder plot gone awry became standard fare for the genre. Along with its technical achievements, Ascenseur pour l’échafaud catapulted Jeanne Moreau to the position of major movie star.

Perhaps no aspect of the film better established the look and feel of French New Wave than the still-iconic soundtrack by Miles Davis. The jazz legend improvised a score after only hearing the plot. The songs were synced to the scenes later. The resulting soundtrack laid the groundwork for modal jazz’s takeover in the early 1960s.

Ascenseur pour l’échafaud changed film history in both sight and sound.

These underappreciated directorial debuts offer a fascinating glimpse into the early careers of some of cinema’s most celebrated filmmakers. From Peter Jackson’s schlocky sci-fi horror to Louis Malle’s groundbreaking French New Wave thriller, each film showcases the unique talent and vision that would define these directors’ future works.

Exploring these films provides a deeper appreciation for the journey and evolution of directorial genius.