Directorial siblings Joe and Anthony Russo and ranking them from worst to best. The past 15 or so years of Hollywood cinema have seen changes that have reverberated throughout the entertainment industry, as well as the public's general understanding of pop culture. Audiences are now fully immersed not only in the age of the superhero movie but of franchise movie-making, with a specific focus on evolving those familiar high-concept IPs into expanded multi-film sagas with labyrinthine interconnected storytelling. Of course, despite many attempts to replicate the mold, the only company that has successfully pulled it off so far is Disney and Marvel Studios with their now-iconic Marvel Cinematic Universe. Thanks to a lot of planning and the involvement of some key film-making talents, the MCU is now the most successful film series ever made, and all in the space of fewer than 12 years. Perhaps the most important directors involved in this cinematic experiment are the brothers Joe and Anthony Russo.
The Russo brothers got their start with a Coen-esque crime caper that few people saw but nonetheless landed the directors the attention of major TV executives. While they continued to dabble in film, albeit with little tangible success, the pair became award-winning staples of television comedies like Arrested Development, Community, and Happy Endings. When they signed on to join the MCU, their hiring was considered a risky one. Even though they had plenty of directorial experience, little of it was in cinema and neither had done much in terms of big action set-pieces. Still, it proved to be a gamble that paid off handsomely for Marvel Studios, and the Russos quickly became their new go-to directors, the ones who would arguably drive the franchise more than any other director — aside from Joss Whedon.
The Russos aren’t exactly defined by any sort of auteur flair, even as trailers describe them somewhat controversially as “visionary directors.” Rather, they represent a throwback to the old-school Hollywood era of the studio director, albeit ones with way bigger budgets and more outward responsibilities. What is most curious about their filmmaking careers is how much they are defined by one franchise. That’s not something many other directors can lay claim to, except, perhaps, for the Harry Potter franchise’s main director David Yates. Still, the Russos’ success in the MCU has seen them accrue major industry power. They are already the second highest-grossing film directors of all time, ahead of the likes of Peter Jackson, Michael Bay, and James Cameron, all of whom have more movies and more years in the business to their names.
With that in mind, we’re taking a look at the short but much-discussed filmography of Joe and Anthony Russo and ranking it from worst to best.
WORST: You, Me, and Dupree
The mid-90s to early 2000s were heavily defined in comedy by the work of the so-called Frat Pack, a loosely connected group of actors who frequently worked together and appeared in many of the era's highest-grossing comedies. The core members of this strange group were figures like Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, and Jack Black, as well as the Wilson brothers Luke and Owen. It's the latter who headlines the rather pointless and forgettable comedy You, Me and Dupree, which signaled the Russo brothers' sophomore effort as film directors. They're clearly directors for hire here, and the comedy itself, about a pair of newlyweds whose lives are upended by their best man's refusal to move out of their house, plays out exactly as you expect it to. The jokes are familiar, the cast is phoning it in, and there's no real bite to this concept that could have gone to some darker places had the screenwriters had the nerve.
Welcome to Collinwood
For their first major directorial debut (the pair's first real movie never got an official release), the Russos managed to wrangle the support of both George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh! Welcome to Collinwood is ostensibly a remake of an Italian comedy called Big Deal on Madonna Street, but its most obvious influences are the Coen Brothers. It never reaches the heights of something like Fargo because the script itself is just too thin to sustain such ambitions. It does, however, feature a top-notch cast of beloved character actors like William H. Macy, Sam Rockwell, Michael Jeter, and Patricia Clarkson, all of whom are aware of what kind of movie they're in and how to play this material.
Related: Every Steven Spielberg Movie Ranked From Worst To Best
Avengers: Infinity War
How do you even begin to approach the Avengers movies of the MCU's third phase? Previous Avengers films had been big and bombastic and climactic in their own ways, but Infinity War was supposed to be the culmination of something far more substantial. The pure scale of Infinity War is in and of itself a grand achievement for the genre. Think of all those actors (and egos) and all those interwoven storylines that needed to be addressed in some form or another. It’s certainly not a movie that newbies to the franchise can jump into without having done their homework, but by this point in time, the MCU had earned that right. Is it too much of a good thing? Sure, but as Mae West said, that can be wonderful. Besides, the sheer quietness of the film following Thanos’s much-feared finger snap and the resulting genocide is still one of the franchise’s most emotionally devastating moments.
Avengers: Endgame
It’s hard to truly judge Avengers: Endgame as its own thing, independent of wider concerns or the immense context it is part of. It was less a movie than the conclusion of a decade-long industry experiment that irrevocably changed Hollywood for a new age of blockbuster cinema. For a three hour epic that has to wrap up a whole heap of loose ends, it's refreshing how much time Endgame takes to just breathe and focus on the traumatic after-effects of that finger snap. There’s more time here for characters to unwind, to banter, and to fully confront the years of stress and confusion they’ve lived with. The Russos get a chance to stretch their well-developed comedy muscles too, and the film features some of the funniest franchise moments not directed by Taika Waititi. After all that build-up – throughout the film itself and across eleven years of waiting – the final battle, while pure fandom pandering, feels wholly earned. It’s no wonder audiences couldn’t get enough of Avengers: Endgame and quickly made it the highest-grossing film of all time.
Captain America: Civil War
While Joss Whedon had shown the immense appeal and sheer blockbuster glory of a superhero team-up with his Avengers movies, but it was 2016's Captain America: Civil War that truly laid the groundwork for the MCU's impending climax. Phase Three of the franchise kicked off in remarkable fashion by giving every fan the over-the-top superhero showdown they'd wanted since they'd acted it out with their action figures during their childhood. It doesn't necessarily seek to transcend the by-now hyper-specific conventions of both the superhero genre and Marvel Studios' movie-making mold, but that's beside the point. It's the Russo Brothers, after all, who helped to make that mold so sturdy and desirable by every other studio in town. Given how much of the film's much-hyped climactic battle happens in one rather mundane location, it's striking how much variety and propulsive energy the Russos manage to wring out of it, as well as key character-beats for the wider narratives and the introductions of figures like Black Panther and the new Spider-Man. The franchise may have been eight years in by this point, but Captain America: Civil War still feels like the start of something big.
BEST: Captain America: The Winter Soldier
It's possible to make the case that 2014's Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the best film in the MCU full stop. While the movie still delivers all the frenetic action scenes and CGI-laden bombast that fans had come to expect from the franchise, The Winter Soldier is at its best when it plays around with its retro influences and tells a more unnerving tale of government subterfuge, paranoia, and conspiracy fiction from the '70s. There's a lot of Three Days of the Condor in here, a dash of Metal Gear Solid, and a surprising amount of political nuance for a genre primarily built on easy-to-define questions of good guys versus bad ones. The movie also gives Chris Evans the opportunity to really show his skills as Captain America, the heart and conscience of the MCU. If any film in the series can stand independent of its mighty context and be judged in terms of its own excellence, it’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier.