Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in the context of "The 400 Blows"

Krzysztof Kieślowski (Polish: [ˈkʂɨʂtɔf kʲɛɕˈlɔfskʲi] , 27 June 1941 – 14 March 1996) was a Polish film director and screenwriter. He is known internationally for Dekalog (1989), The Double Life of Veronique (1991), and the Three Colours trilogy (1993–1994).

Kieślowski received numerous awards during his career, including the Cannes Film Festival Jury Prize (1988), FIPRESCI Prize (1988, 1991), and Prize of the Ecumenical Jury (1991), the Venice Film Festival FIPRESCI Prize (1989), Golden Lion (1993), and OCIC Award (1993), and the Berlin International Film Festival Silver Bear (1994). In 1995, he received Academy Award nominations for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. In 2002, Kieślowski was listed at number two on the British Film Institute's Sight & Sound list of the top ten film directors of modern times. In 2007, Total Film magazine ranked him at No. 47 on its "100 Greatest Film Directors Ever" list.

The Three Colours trilogy (French: Trois couleurs, Polish: Trzy kolory) is the collective title of three psychological drama films directed by Krzysztof Kieślowski, co-written by Kieślowski and Krzysztof Piesiewicz (with story consultants Agnieszka Holland and Sławomir Idziak), produced by Marin Karmitz and composed by Zbigniew Preisner. The trilogy consists of Three Colours: Blue (1993), Three Colours: White (1994), and Three Colours: Red (1994). The trilogy, while not sharing a specific storyline, thematically examines the French Revolutionary ideals, and is interconnected, particularly in Red, with cameo appearances of characters from Blue and White.

Represented by the Flag of France, the trilogy is an international co-production between France, Poland, and Switzerland in the French language, with the exception of White in Polish and French. All three films garnered widespread acclaim from reviews, with Red receiving nominations for Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Cinematography at the 67th Academy Awards.

Quentin Jerome Tarantino (/ˌtærənˈtiːnoʊ/ TARR-ən-TEE-noh; born March 27, 1963) is an American filmmaker, actor, and author. His films are characterized by graphic violence, extended dialogue often featuring much profanity, and references to popular culture. His work has earned a cult following alongside critical and commercial success; he has been named by some as the most influential director of his generation and has received numerous awards and nominations, including two Academy Awards, two BAFTA Awards, and four Golden Globe Awards. His films have grossed more than $1.9 billion worldwide.

Tarantino began his career with the independent crime film Reservoir Dogs (1992). His second film, the crime comedy-drama Pulp Fiction (1994), was a major success and won numerous awards, including the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. He next wrote and starred in the action horror film From Dusk till Dawn (1996). His third film as director, Jackie Brown (1997), paid homage to blaxploitation films.

Sylvester Gardenzio "Sly" Stallone (/stəˈloʊn/ stə-LOHN; born July 6, 1946) is an American actor, painter and filmmaker. In a film career spanning more than fifty years, Stallone has received numerous accolades, including a Golden Globe Award and a Critics' Choice Award, as well as nominations for three Academy Awards and two BAFTA Awards. Stallone is one of only two actors in history (alongside Harrison Ford) to have starred in a box-office No. 1 film across six consecutive decades. Films in which he has appeared have grossed over $7.5 billion worldwide.

Struggling as an actor for a number of years upon moving to New York City in 1969, Stallone found gradual work in films such as The Lords of Flatbush (1974). He achieved his greatest critical and commercial success starting in 1976 with his iconic role as boxer Rocky Balboa in the first film of the successful Rocky franchise, which he also wrote. In 1977, he became the third actor in history to be nominated for two Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor. He portrayed the PTSD-plagued soldier John Rambo in First Blood (1982), a role he would play across five Rambo films (1982–2019). He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1984. From the mid-1980s to the late 1990s, Stallone would go on to become one of Hollywood's highest-paid actors acting in action films such as Cobra (1986), Tango and Cash (1989), Cliffhanger (1993), Demolition Man (1993), and The Specialist (1994). At the height of his career, Stallone was known for his rivalry with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Thelma & Louise is a 1991 American buddy comedy-drama film directed by Ridley Scott and written by Callie Khouri. The film stars Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon as Thelma and Louise, two friends who embark on a road trip that ends up in unforeseen circumstances. The supporting cast includes Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Christopher McDonald, and Brad Pitt. Filming took place in California and Utah from June to August 1990.

Following its premiere at the 44th Cannes Film Festival on May 20, 1991, Thelma & Louise was theatrically released in the United States on May 24. It became a critical and commercial success, receiving six nominations at the 64th Academy Awards, with Khouri winning Best Original Screenplay. Scott was nominated for Best Director, and both Sarandon and Davis were nominated for Best Actress.

Bridesmaids is a 2011 American comedy film directed by Paul Feig from a screenplay by Annie Mumolo and Kristen Wiig. It stars Wiig as a woman who experiences a series of misfortunes after being asked to serve as maid of honor for her best friend, played by Maya Rudolph. The ensemble cast also features Rose Byrne, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Ellie Kemper, Melissa McCarthy and Chris O'Dowd.

Actresses Mumolo and Wiig wrote the screenplay after the latter was cast in Judd Apatow's comedy Knocked Up (2007). Upon its theatrical release in the United States on May 13, 2011, Bridesmaids was a critical and commercial success. It grossed over $306 million worldwide on a $32.5 million budget, and surpassed Knocked Up to become the top-grossing Apatow Productions film to date. At the 84th Academy Awards, McCarthy was nominated for Best Supporting Actress, and Wiig and Mumolo for Best Original Screenplay.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a 2004 American romantic drama film directed by Michel Gondry and written by Charlie Kaufman from a story by Gondry, Kaufman, and Pierre Bismuth. It stars Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet as a couple who undergo memory erasure after they break up. Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood and Tom Wilkinson appear in supporting roles. The title of the film is a quotation from the 1717 poem Eloisa to Abelard by Alexander Pope. It uses elements of psychological drama and science fiction and a nonlinear narrative to explore the nature of memory and love.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind opened in theaters in the United States on March 19, 2004, to widespread acclaim from critics, who praised the script and direction. The film was a box office success, grossing $74 million on a $20 million budget, and was named by the American Film Institute one of the Top 10 Films of 2004. At the 77th Academy Awards, Bismuth, Gondry and Kaufman won Best Original Screenplay, and Winslet received a nomination for Best Actress.

Alfonso Cuarón Orozco (US: /kwɑːˈroʊn/ kwar-OHN; Spanish: [alˈfonso kwaˈɾon] ; born 28 November 1961) is a Mexican filmmaker. His accolades include four Academy Awards, three Golden Globe Awards seven BAFTA Awards and one Golden Lion.

Cuarón made his feature film debut with the romantic comedy Sólo con tu pareja (1991), and directed the film adaptations A Little Princess (1995), and Great Expectations (1998). His breakthrough came with the coming-of-age film Y tu mamá también (2001) which earned him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and won him the Venice Film Festival Award for Best Screenplay. He gained greater prominence for directing the fantasy film Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004), the dystopian drama Children of Men (2006), the science fiction drama Gravity (2013), and the semi-autobiographical drama Roma (2018). The latter two won him Academy Awards for Best Director. He also won Best Film Editing for Gravity and Best Cinematography for Roma.

Lifeboat is a 1944 American survival film directed by Alfred Hitchcock from a story by John Steinbeck. It stars Tallulah Bankhead and William Bendix, alongside Walter Slezak, Mary Anderson, John Hodiak, Henry Hull, Heather Angel, Hume Cronyn and Canada Lee. The film is set entirely on a lifeboat launched from a freighter torpedoed and sunk by a Nazi U-boat.

The first in Hitchcock's "limited-setting" films, the others being Rope (1948), Dial M for Murder and Rear Window (both 1954), it is the only film Hitchcock made for 20th Century Fox. The film received three Oscar nominations for Best Director, Best Original Story and Best Cinematography – Black and White. Bankhead won the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress.

Francis Ford Coppola (/ˈkoʊpələ/ KOH-pə-lə; born April 7, 1939) is an American filmmaker. Considered one of the leading figures of the New Hollywood era as well as one of the pioneers of the gangster film genre, Coppola is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers in the history of cinema. Coppola is the recipient of five Academy Awards, a BAFTA Award, three Golden Globe Awards, and two Palmes d'Or, in addition to nominations for two Emmy Awards and a Grammy Award. Coppola was honored with the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award in 2010, the Kennedy Center Honors in 2024, and the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2025.

Coppola started his career directing The Rain People (1969) and co-writing Patton (1970), the latter of which earned him and Edmund H. North the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Coppola's reputation as a filmmaker was cemented with the release of The Godfather (1972) and The Godfather Part II (1974) which both earned Academy Awards for Best Picture, and the latter earned him Best Director. The films revolutionized the gangster genre. Coppola released the thriller The Conversation (1974), which received the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.