Rating America’s Contemporary Directors

Mathews earned a slap in the face when he stated that the Corleone saga, until a few weeks ago, was on its way to being “perhaps the only certifiable American film masterpiece of the second half of the 20th Century.”

The only certifiable American masterpiece since 1950?

Perhaps Mathews hasn’t seen John Ford’s “The Searchers” (1956) or Fritz Lang’s “The Big Heat” (1953) or Orson Welles’ “Touch of Evil” (1958) or Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rear Window” (1954), “Vertigo” (1958), “North by Northwest” (1959), “Psycho” (1960) and “The Birds” (1963). Maybe he hasn’t seen Sam Fuller’s “Forty Guns” (1957) or Nicholas Ray’s “Johnny Guitar” (1954) or Douglas Sirk’s “Written on the Wind” (1957) and “Imitation of Life” (1959).

M. RAND

Los Angeles