We may have looked at some of the best performances by the actors and actresses of some of 2009's best movies but no film would be complete without a director.
And this year there have been some impressive work by those behind the camera with some making a name for themselves whilst other merely added to an already impressive body of work.
Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp made his feature film debut this year with the outstanding District 9, which was produced by none other than Peter Jackson.
Thirty years ago, aliens made first contact with Earth. Humans waited for the hostile attack, or the giant advances in technology. Neither came.
Instead, the aliens were refugees, the last survivors of their home world. The creatures were set up in a makeshift home in South Africa's District 9 as the world's nations argued over what to do with them.
The Multi-National United (MNU)keep a watchful eye on the slum where the aliens now live and the peace between the humans and aliens is beginning to disintegrate.
Wikus Van Der Merwe (Sharlto Copley) leads the MNU into the slums in a bid to re-home them outside of Johannesburg when he ingests a black liquid and begins to transform.
It's very rare that a movie lives up to all of it's hype but District 9 did exactly that as Blomkamp showed no signs that he was a first time feature film-maker as he produced a classic of a movie.
And Blomkmap has a very distinct documentary style of filming which worked really well for this movie as it put the audience right in the middle of the action from the word go as we see events through the eyes of Wikus.
It's not just a mindless movie, although there are some great action se pieces, but it's a film that looks at the human condition and what it means to be human, is a study of racial tension while suggesting that humanity, compassion and understanding goes beyond our own race.
Danny Boyle
2009 has been one hell of a year for Danny Boyle as Slumdog Millionaire went from almost a straight to DVD movie to a multi Oscar winning picture.
The movie put him back on the international stage, where he belongs, as Slumdog scooped the best Picture Oscar and Boyle himself took home Best Director.
Boyle isn't afraid to dig into India's underbelly highlighting exploitation, corruption and the difficulties to survive and he contrasts this beautifully with the colours and the life that bursts out of the slums.
This is, without a shadow of a doubt, Boyle's best work since Trainspotting back in 1996 and along with Anthony Dod Mantle's cinematography, which really brings India alive to the point where the country is a character in its own right, they plunge the audience into this foreign world for which they feel affection by the end of the film.
Since his Oscar success things have gone quiet for the director as he picks his next project, he was linked to the twenty third James Bond movie and the remake of My Fair Lady.
However there does appear to be a few projects in the pipeline including 127 Hours and a possible 28 Weeks Later sequel.
Kathryn Bigelow
It's fair to say that all movies that have looked at the war on terrorism haven't done very well with critics or with audiences. But there is always an exception to that rule and this year in came in the form of The Hurt Locker.
Iraq. Forced to play a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse in the chaos of war, an elite Army bomb squad unit must come together in a city where everyone is a potential enemy and every object could be a deadly bomb.
Bigelow has produced a truly outstanding movie that is the best war film that has graced the big screen in many a year.
What makes this movie so powerful is the absence of politics at no point, like in so many movies that have gone before, does filmmaker Bigelow question the reasons why the war is taking part or the death toll and this comes as a refreshing change.
Instead the movie is the personal perspective of James, Sanborn and Eldridge as they face the horrors of modern warfare mixed with the adrenaline buzz of their task in Iraq.
The movie was a huge critical hit and looks set to reap the rewards on the festival circuit, if this movie isn't nominated for an Oscar then there is something sadly wrong.
Bigelow has been nominated for Best Director at the Seattle International Film Festival, Golden Satellite and the Golden Globes.
Clint Eastwood
Clint Eastwood is a true cinema icon who has portrayed some of cinema's most iconic characters. But in recent years he has proved to be just as handy in the director's chair as he was in front of the camera.
Earlier this year he directed and starred in Gran Torino. He starred as Walt Kowalski, an unabashed bigot who never heard a racial insult he didn't love.
Bitter, haunted, and full of pride, Walt refuses to abandon the neighbourhood he's lived in for decades despite its changing demographics as he clings desperately to a mind set long since out of step with the times.
When his Hmong neighbour Thao tries to steal his prized muscle car as part of a gang initiation, Walt is forced to grapple with the world around him.
Gran Torino provides one of Eastwood’s best on screen performances as Walt struggles to come to terms with the changing world around him as well as showing his own prejudices and ignorance.
In all Gran Torino is truly a classy piece of filmmaking, which is what we have come to expect from Eastwood with the likes of Unforgiven, Changeling and Million Dollar Baby under his belt, this falls alongside them.
Hard to believe that he was overlooked in all Oscar categories earlier this year.
But he's back in the New Year with Invictus, a biopic of Nelson Mandela, which stars Morgan Freeman.
While it was a nearly favourite for award glory it has been somewhat overlooked in the early part of the awards season. Despite not picking up a Best Picture Golden Globe nod Eastwood did pick up a Best Director nomination.
And he already has another movie on the horizon, which reunites him with Matt Damon, thriller hereafter.
FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw
We may have looked at some of the best performances by the actors and actresses of some of 2009's best movies but no film would be complete without a director.
And this year there have been some impressive work by those behind the camera with some making a name for themselves whilst other merely added to an already impressive body of work.
Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp made his feature film debut this year with the outstanding District 9, which was produced by none other than Peter Jackson.
Thirty years ago, aliens made first contact with Earth. Humans waited for the hostile attack, or the giant advances in technology. Neither came.
Instead, the aliens were refugees, the last survivors of their home world. The creatures were set up in a makeshift home in South Africa's District 9 as the world's nations argued over what to do with them.
The Multi-National United (MNU)keep a watchful eye on the slum where the aliens now live and the peace between the humans and aliens is beginning to disintegrate.
Wikus Van Der Merwe (Sharlto Copley) leads the MNU into the slums in a bid to re-home them outside of Johannesburg when he ingests a black liquid and begins to transform.
It's very rare that a movie lives up to all of it's hype but District 9 did exactly that as Blomkamp showed no signs that he was a first time feature film-maker as he produced a classic of a movie.
And Blomkmap has a very distinct documentary style of filming which worked really well for this movie as it put the audience right in the middle of the action from the word go as we see events through the eyes of Wikus.
It's not just a mindless movie, although there are some great action se pieces, but it's a film that looks at the human condition and what it means to be human, is a study of racial tension while suggesting that humanity, compassion and understanding goes beyond our own race.
Danny Boyle
2009 has been one hell of a year for Danny Boyle as Slumdog Millionaire went from almost a straight to DVD movie to a multi Oscar winning picture.
The movie put him back on the international stage, where he belongs, as Slumdog scooped the best Picture Oscar and Boyle himself took home Best Director.
Boyle isn't afraid to dig into India's underbelly highlighting exploitation, corruption and the difficulties to survive and he contrasts this beautifully with the colours and the life that bursts out of the slums.
This is, without a shadow of a doubt, Boyle's best work since Trainspotting back in 1996 and along with Anthony Dod Mantle's cinematography, which really brings India alive to the point where the country is a character in its own right, they plunge the audience into this foreign world for which they feel affection by the end of the film.
Since his Oscar success things have gone quiet for the director as he picks his next project, he was linked to the twenty third James Bond movie and the remake of My Fair Lady.
However there does appear to be a few projects in the pipeline including 127 Hours and a possible 28 Weeks Later sequel.
Kathryn Bigelow
It's fair to say that all movies that have looked at the war on terrorism haven't done very well with critics or with audiences. But there is always an exception to that rule and this year in came in the form of The Hurt Locker.
Iraq. Forced to play a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse in the chaos of war, an elite Army bomb squad unit must come together in a city where everyone is a potential enemy and every object could be a deadly bomb.
Bigelow has produced a truly outstanding movie that is the best war film that has graced the big screen in many a year.
What makes this movie so powerful is the absence of politics at no point, like in so many movies that have gone before, does filmmaker Bigelow question the reasons why the war is taking part or the death toll and this comes as a refreshing change.
Instead the movie is the personal perspective of James, Sanborn and Eldridge as they face the horrors of modern warfare mixed with the adrenaline buzz of their task in Iraq.
The movie was a huge critical hit and looks set to reap the rewards on the festival circuit, if this movie isn't nominated for an Oscar then there is something sadly wrong.
Tagged in Kathryn Bigelow