7 days until Oscar. 7-time Best Director nominees

It's seven sleeps until Oscar night so today's magic discussion number is SEVEN! Exactly seven directors in history have received seven (or more) nominations for Best Director in the Academy's 93 year history. For fun we've listed that magic seventh nomination below, though coincidentally none of these directors won their seventh time in the race (all had already won). They are, in alpha order:

 

• Woody Allen (7 noms / 1 win)  MIDNIGHT IN PARIS in 2011
• David Lean (7 noms / 2 wins)  A PASSAGE TO INDIA in 1984
• Martin Scorsese (9 noms / 1 win)  HUGO in 2011
• Steven Spielberg (7 noms / 2 wins)  LINCOLN in 2012
• Billy Wilder (8 noms / 2 wins)  SOME LIKE IT HOT in 1959
• William Wyler (12 noms / 3 wins)  THE HEIRESS in 1949
• Fred Zinneman (7 noms / 2 wins)  JULIA in 1977 

COMMENT PARTY QUESTIONS:
1. Which of these seven men is the all time best director?
2. And which of these "seventh nominations" is the best?

Your answer might well be different for each of those questions. 

P.S. No currently living directors are anywhere close to joining this list. The closest are Francis Ford Coppola (81 years old), Clint Eastwood (90 years old), and Peter Weir (76 years old), all well behind with 4 Best Director nominations. Behind them with 3 nominations each are Coen, Daldry, Iñárritu, Ivory, Ang Lee, Lynch, Polanski, Russell, Scott, Stone, and Tarantino. No female director has been nominated more than once but we'll get there. This year women made up 40% of the Best Director category, an all time record...with a third woman totally in the conversation though not nominated, which suggests that the industry has rapidly become more inclusive in the past few years once the pressure was on.

Comments

[James]

Marsha Mason-

Three directors have each been nominated for Best Director four times while their films were not nominated for Best Picture.

Woody Allen (Interiors, Broadway Danny Rose, Crimes and Misdemeanors, and Bullets Over Broadway)

Clarence Brown (Anna Christie, Romance, A Free Soul, and National Velvet)

Federico Fellini (La Dolce Vita, Federico Fellini's 8 1/2, Fellini Satyricon, and Amacord)

[James]

And just for fun, here is the list of the nine Oscar nominated directors whose films received no additional nominations

Lewis Milestone - Two Arabian Knights (the first Best Director recipient)
Ted Wilde - Speedy
Herbert Brenon - Sorrell and Son
King Vidor - The Love Parade
Mark Robson - The Inn of the Sixth Happiness
Arthur Penn - Alice's Restaurant
Federico Fellini - Fellini Satyricon
Martin Scorsese - The Last Temptation of Christ
Robert Altman - Short Cuts

[Joe G.]

Lean, Wilder, and Wyler are all in a class of their own here. There’s something about their versatility that the other directors simply don’t have.

I actually think Hugo is a pretty great nomination. But it think Some Like it Hot is such a gem, that it’s the best of this lineup.

[Amy Camus]

James - King Vidor's nomination was for Hallelujah

[Amy Camus]

James - King Vidor's nomination was for Hallelujah

[Amy Camus]

James - Technically, Clarence Brown's nominations for Anna Christie and Romance were just one nomination for his year's work

Also, you completely omitted David Lynch, who's been his film's sole nomination twice: in 1986 for Blue Velvet and in 2001 for Mulholland Drive

[Raul]

1. This will be unpopular, but Spielberg gets my vote for best.
2. Some Like It Hot is the best 7th nomination.