Thriller
Rod Lott
In 1956, three years after helming the film-noir classic “The Big Heat,” director Fritz Lang returned to the genre for a pair of films that prove to be his final for America: “Beyond a Reasonable Doubt” and “While the City Sleeps.”

Action
Rod Lott
Can Steven Soderbergh do a martial arts-fueled action thriller? That was rhetorical in a bear-crap way; the guy can do anything. Best known for Traffic and the Ocean's Eleven franchise, he's a director par excellence, even when the story goes to snuff in his experimental larks, like casting porn star Sasha Grey as the lead in 2009’s no-budget drama The Girlfriend Experience.