Ben Affleck names his favourite director of all time: “He knows I really look up to him”
The world of cinema is littered, of course, with those actors who embody the very nature of celebrity. After all, through their roles in films, actors become some of the most recognisable faces in the world, and it can be said with great ease that one of the most famous is the truly iconic Ben Affleck.
After coming to the public’s attention with acting roles in Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused and Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy, Affleck announced himself as a writer too with Good Will Hunting, written in partnership with Matt Damon, won the Academy Award for ‘Best Original Screenplay’.
This was all before the turn of the millennium, of course, so Affleck still had so much more to give on the horizon. Eventually, he turned his seemingly endless talents to directing, beginning with 2007’s Gone Baby Gone and followed up with the critically admired The Town and Argo.
Affleck naturally has his personal favourites from within the film industry, but from a directing perspective, there looks to be one person at the top of the list, and that is the inimitable Paul Thomas Anderson. During an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, he let slip that Anderson is his number one director.
He’d be discussing his film Air and admitted that he showed it to Anderson, “my favourite director of all time,” he said. “He knows I really look up to him,” Affleck said. “And he was like, ‘This is just a fun movie. I like this movie.’ And I’m thinking, ‘Is it a masterpiece?’”
Evidently, Affleck wanted more from Anderson as he considers him such an inspiration. He continued: “Because I think he really is a genius. This guy knows how to do this. Sometimes I get a sort of a [Antonio] Salieri feeling around him. Yeah, I’m good enough to know how great you really are.”
Anderson has indeed directed several masterpiece movies, including Boogie Nights, There Will Be Blood, The Master and Inherent Vice, and Affleck feels that he embodies the artistic spirit of the Italian composer Antonio Salieri, one of the most significant figures in the development of 18th-century opera.
Affleck has carved out a path for himself as not only a fine actor and writer but also a widely admired director, too. He can only wish to be considered to be half as good as his favourite director, Paul Thomas Anderson, but there’s still time for him to make his mark on the directing scene.
