Ron Howard isn’t the most prolific director in mainstream Hollywood – Steven Spielberg and Ridley Scott have both directed more than his 27th movies to date – but he’s certainly right up there.
That he can even be mentioned in the same breath as those two titans is a testament to Howard’s standing, or at least his staying power. What’s even more remarkable is that he had a whole earlier career in front of the camera, starring in two hit series (The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days), as well as George Lucas’s second feature film, American Graffiti.
It kind of makes you feel like an underachiever, doesn’t it? Thankfully, we’ve got a new film to look forward to from Hollywood’s ultimate people pleaser.
Howard’s 28th movie recently hit cinemas on the 22nd of August. Eden is a promising-looking survival thriller starring Jude Law, Ana de Armas, Vanessa Kirby, Sydney Sweeney, and Daniel Brühl.
It’s the late 1920s, and three groups of Europeans converge on a remote Galapagos island, each seeking a new way of life. Their conflicting ideals and desires gradually culminate in conflict and calamity.
Based on a true story, it sees Howard shaking off his hard-won nice guy reputation and delving into darker subject matter – though some might argue that Hillbilly Elegy was grimmer than the very worst torture porn.
Regardless, it all looks like good popcorn-munching fun. We’d expect nothing less from a Ron Howard production. Say what you like about his brand of filmmaking, ol’ Richie Cunningham sure knows how to entertain.
If you needed any reminder of that fact, check out some of his best films. We’ll bet you forgot that some of them were even directed by Howard.
10. Cinderella Man
Cinderella Man tells the real-life story of James Braddock (played by Russell Crowe), who is forced to give up his boxing career after breaking his hand right just as the Great Depression is beginning. His story of redemption and sporting resurgence is classic Hollywood fare, and Ron Howard is just the director you want at the helm for such a thing. It might lack the gravitas of the first collaboration between star and director, A Beautiful Mind, but Cinderella Man has bags of heart.
9. Cocoon
Howard’s third film was this sci-fi fantasy, and it brought the director his first taste of Oscar success – albeit in the lesser categories of Best Supporting Actor and Best Visual Effects. It’s sentimental stuff, with its tale of benevolent aliens reinvigorating a community of OAPs, but such accusations never knocked Spielberg off his stride. Howard manages to find a similar balance to the old master, thanks to the warmth of its script and the likability of its ageing cast.
8. EDtv
Unfortunately lost in the glare of The Truman Show, which covered similar themes just a year earlier, EDtv is worth revisiting. It's a tale of a 24-hour reality TV show, which follows Matthew McConaughey’s hapless schlub (possible miscasting there) around, proving even more prescient than the more popular Jim Carrey vehicle.
It’s also just a warm, sweet, romantic comedy in its own right, with a stacked supporting cast that includes Woody Harrelson, Dennis Hopper, Martin Landau, and Ellen DeGeneres before she became everyone’s least favourite TV host.
7. The Paper
Perhaps its lack of flashy special effects or plot gimmicks counted against it, but The Paper is another under-appreciated Ron Howard gem. It follows 24 hours in the life of a New York newspaper and its editor, Henry Hackett, played in trademark energetic style by Michael Keaton. When a hot story emerges with an unsavoury racial edge, Hackett threatens his career and family life in pursuit of the truth. Few films of this kind (though there aren’t many) capture the chaos of the newsroom quite as well, which is a testament to the director.
6. Splash
Lonely man stumbles across beautiful, mute, naked woman – might she be a mermaid? As concepts go, it sounds like a sleazy B-movie. In Ron Howard’s reliable hands, however, Splash is a (mostly) family-friendly feel-good hit, and one of the defining romantic comedies of the early 1980s. It helps when you have a pair of leads, in Daryl Hannah and Tom Hanks, who are as charismatic as they come, but Splash’s appeal runs a little deeper than that. It’s charming, funny, and silly in all the right ways.
5. A Beautiful Mind
Russell Crowe plays John Nash, the troubled maths genius whose work is derailed by serious mental health issues. But is he being paranoid, or are there really Soviet agents on his case? A Beautiful Mind seems fine-calibrated for Oscar success, from Crowe’s heavyweight lead performance to Roger Deakin’s beautiful cinematography. The fact that it delivered Howard the awards for Best Picture and Best Director (alongside two others) simply confirms what a seasoned pro he had become by the start of the 21st century.
4. Parenthood
It’s easy to dismiss Parenthood as another slick ‘80s dramedy, but it’s actually one of the best examples of the format. Just look at what this charming and perceptive movie has to offer, starting with an enviable generation-bridging cast that includes Steve Martin, Keanu Reeves, Dianne Wiest, Rick Moranis, and a young Joaquin Phoenix. The film deals perceptively with regular family issues in a gently amusing fashion, but it never goes chasing laughs at the expense of its characters. Watch Parenthood, and you might just come away thinking everything’s going to be alright.
3. Rush
Ron Howard takes another stab at sports biography, this time the dual tale of Formula 1 racing drivers James Hunt and Nicky Lauder and their famous rivalry, both on and off the track. Chris Hemsworth and Daniel Brühl are perfectly cast in the lead roles, highlighting the ‘fire and ice’ contrast between these two talented sportsmen. But it’s Howard’s assured direction, particularly during the thrilling racing scenes, that marks Rush out as one of the better sports films of the 21st century.
2. Frost/Nixon
One of Ron Howard’s most gripping and compelling films is about two men sat in a room talking. Not bad for a director who has largely made his name on glossy films about astronauts and mermaids. Of course, Frost/Nixon doesn’t concern just any two men, but rather a charismatic British journalist (David Frost) interviewing a disgraced US president (Richard Nixon). Michael Sheen and Frank Langella do a wonderful job of bringing out the two contrasting personalities, as the former tries to pin the latter on his past indiscretions. Howard is left to apply his deft craft to a sharp script from playwright Peter Morgan.
1. Apollo 13
Ron Howard’s crowning achievement has to be this faithful retelling of a 1969 near-disaster, in which the crew of a scuppered lunar mission find themselves forced to problem-solve their way back to Earth. Even knowing how it all turns out – whether from history or previous viewings – this is impossibly tense and compelling stuff. The cast is as on top of its game as the director, too, with the main crew of three real-life heroes played with equal parts grace and grit by Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon and the late Bill Paxton.
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