Take Me to the River

For the cathartic shootout in Unforgiven, Clint Eastwood the director stuck to his guns, aiming for the gut rather than the intellect.

In Lords of Dogtown, director Catherine Hardwicke captures the '70s skateboard culture of L.A.'s Venice with kinetic energy, gritty authenticity and a local's knowledge of the scene.

In the opening sequence of The Thin Blue Line, Errol Morris enhances his quest for the truth with innovative, and controversial, style.

In Lisa Cholodenko's The Kids Are All Right, evidence of an affair sparks an epiphany the audience can feel from the inside out.

In Breaking Bad's series finale, director Vince Gilligan orchestrates an intimate emotional farewell between a self-indulgent kingpin and his embattled wife.

During an alien birth on Men in Black, director Barry Sonnenfeld keeps the frame mostly fixed, allowing the audience to find the comedy.

In Rob Marshall's feature debut, his musical mastery reaches its apex in a pivotal production number.

The directors of Little Miss Sunshine deconstruct a crucial meltdown in the indie sensation of 2006.

Using multiple lenses, focal points, flashbacks and innumerable cuts, Jean-Marc Vallée completes the puzzle in the Big Little Lies season finale.

As the Khmer Rouge rumbles into Phnom Penh in The Killing Fields, director Roland Joffé captures the fear and dread with constant movement.

Martin Campbell's second Bond outing is action-packed, but a pivotal poker game between 007 and his arch nemesis gave the director pause.

Thomas Schlamme guides us through the culminating moments of the finale of The West Wing's second season, often described as one of the greatest moments in television history.

Director David O. Russell deconstructs the riveting third act of his acclaimed 2012 serio-comedy Silver Linings Playbook — a dance competition sequence with high stakes for all involved.

Miguel Sapochnik's "Battle of the Bastards" episode of Game of Thrones rivals epic big-screen confrontations, as the director gives us the blow-by-blow on the choices and inspirations behind his battle royal.

For the introduction of Johnny Depp’s iconic character, director Gore Verbinski created a surrealistic playground. Here’s how he did it.

Directors have been describing iconic scenes from their films for years in these pages. In excerpts from those stories, they explain how they created some of cinema’s most famous moments.

For the daring finale of Six Feet Under, director Alan Ball killed off the beloved characters he’d spent five years creating. He explains why it was the perfect ending—and how he pulled it off.

For the opening of Austin Powers in Goldmember, the third film in the franchise, director Jay Roach had fun playing with audience expectations and created an actual action scene—starring Tom Cruise—until the real Austin silliness takes over.

Eight years after it aired, the finale of The Sopranos continues to be hotly debated. David Chase explains how he created the excruciating tension of the last scene. What he won’t say is what happened at the end.

With this rooftop chase in The Bourne Ultimatum—all jolting camerawork and spiky editing—Greengrass redefined the punch and power of action filmmaking.

Roland Emmerich pushed the bounds of special effects by combining exploding models with digital images and live action in the still-rousing alien attack in Independence Day.

The kiss on the ship's bow in Titanic gave the film its emotional core. James Cameron explains how he used natural and man-made elements to create the complex scene.

Frank Darabont had audiences cheering as Tim Robbins escaped from prison in The Shawshank Redemption (1994). The director explains how he set him free.

John Badham’s Saturday Night Fever helped create the disco craze of the late ’70s. But nostalgia aside, the climactic dance contest was a precisely directed piece of filmmaking.

The success of Richard Donner’s Superman depended on making the flying scenes seem real. Here’s how he pulled it off before digital effects made it look easy.

In his groundbreaking and influential Hong Kong feature Hard Boiled, John Woo created a style and template for modern action movies.

Oliver Stone explains how he staged a demonstration at the 1972 Republican National Convention in Born on the Fourth of July.

Alan Parker recalls directing one of the most famous and violent scenes in the Turkish prison drama Midnight Express.

Director Philip Kaufman explored American heroism in the early days of the space program in his 1983 feature The Right Stuff. In this DGA Quarterly: Shot to Remember sequence, Kaufman reveals how astronaut John Glenn earned his stripes.

Steven Spielberg explains how he staged the massive D-Day invasion in Saving Private Ryan—and without storyboards.

In Rocky, John Avildsen's guerilla filmmaking on the streets of Philadelphia for perhaps the most famous training sequence ever might not have been possible without a great new invention-- the Steadicam.

Somehow Warren Beatty persuaded a major studio to let him make Reds, his passion project about John Reed and the Russian Revolution. The director describes how he shot a climactic confrontation between art and politics.

Norman Jewison explains how he captured the tension of the civil rights era in one explosive scene in In the Heat of the Night.

Using a skeleton crew and real actors, John Boorman captured the physical challenge of navigating rapids in Deliverance.

John Glen explains how he shot a plane flying through a hangar in the heart-pounding opening of Octopussy.

In The Graduate, Mike Nichols captured not only the delicate mental state of his anti-hero, but the despair of the nation’s youth. The director looks back at how he shot one of the film’s most iconic, dreamlike sequences.

The mayhem at the end of Fatal Attraction was one of the most startling and talked-about climaxes of its day. Adrian Lyne explains how he built the scene’s suspense, step by fateful step.

Michael Cimino's nail-biting Russian roulette sequence captured the horror of war perhaps like none other before. The director explains how he created the excruciating tension.

Fifty-seven years after it was made, Singin' in the Rain remains the high-water mark of American musicals. Stanley Donen remembers shooting the iconic sequence where Gene Kelly blissfully ignores the weather.

Amy Heckerling recalls how she got the most out of her young cast, including Sean Penn as the legendary stoner Jeff Spicoli, in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.

Wolfgang Petersen explains how he created the giant waves and rolling emotions for the dramatic climax of The Perfect Storm.

With the climactic scene in Bonnie and Clyde, Arthur Penn forever changed how violence was portrayed on screen. He explains how he created his brutal ballet.

William Friedkin recalls with amazing detail how he directed the horrifying climatic scene of The Exorcist.

Christopher Nolan tried to shoot as much as he could the climatic chase in Batman Begins in camera. He explains how he did it.

Bernardo Bertolucci revisits China's Forbidden City to explain how he filmed the coronation of the child ruler in the nine-time Academy Award winner, The Last Emperor.

Ron Howard revisits the launch sequence from Apollo 13 and explains how he made it look so real.

Ever wonder how Werner Herzog dragged a steamboat over a mountain in Fitzcarraldo? The director tells all.

In this DGA Quarterly “Shot to Remember” article, Ang Lee explains how he shot his famous treetop battle in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Bill Condon explains how he kept the plot moving and the music jumping in one of the big production numbers from Dreamgirls.

Milos Forman made a spectacle of Amadeus over 20 years ago. He talks about achieving a mix of Old World craft and Hollywood style.

Terry Gilliam had the time of his life directing his dream project. He explains how he applied his hand-hewn methods to create his hero's great escape.

Years ahead of its time, Blade Runner set the standard for futuristic angst. Ridley Scott leads us through the film's glorious finale.

Peter Jackson tells how he got King Kong up the Empire State Building.

In Master and Commander, the director captures the intensity and beauty of fighting ships with a combination of modern technology and old-fashioned storytelling.