Danny Boyle

Danny Boyle, known for his sidesplitting black humor and his eye for grittiness, is one of the most significant contemporary British filmmakers around. After getting his start on British TV in the early '90s, directing episodes of popular series including Inspector Morse, For the Greater Good, he made his feature film debut in 1994 with the BAFTA-winning Shallow Grave.

It wasn't until 1996, however, that he was thrown into the international spotlight on the strength of the cult classic film Trainspotting, a movie that it obvious that heroin is the worst thing in the world, and that Danny Boyle is one of the best. In the following decade, Boyle continued his success, helming a flurry of films, from sci-fi thrillers (Sunshine), to adventure dramas (The Beach), to straight zombie-horror flicks (28 Days Later).

Slumdog Millionaire, however, released in 2008, was a success unlike anything in Boyle's already decidedly successful catalogue. Slumdog launched the filmmaker into the cinematic stratosphere, ultimately landing him an Academy Award for Best Director.

Interestingly, though, in Boyle's repertoire, Slumdog is pretty much an anomaly. Sure it's gritty, and sure it has its darkly comedic moments. But at its core, it is a romance and a melodramatic one, at that.

Boyle hasn't been very prolific since Slumdog, but with him, it's always been quality over quantity. In 2010 he teamed up again with Slumdog screenwriter Simon Beaufoy and composer A.R. Rahman for 127 Hours, resulting in Academy Award nominations for the three of them. More recently, he helmed Steve Jobs, based on Walter Isaacson's biography of the Apple founder, and featuring a screenplay by Aaron Sorkin.