Pop Culture Bracketology: Film, Indie Darlings Directors Region

With March Madness upon us, WEEKEND has gone a little bracket crazy. Over the next month, our staff will debate, discuss and argue their way through three 64-team pop culture-centric brackets to determine the best TV series on the air, the best active film director and the best music act of the moment. We will now post the pairings and starting next Monday, March 15, we'll begin weeding out the pretenders and celebrating the contenders. Posts will be updated accordingly.

For our film bracket, we are trying to figure out the best active, working director. The four regions are as follows: Veterans, Newbies(ish), Indie Darlings and Populist Pros. Below are the pairings in the Indie Darlings Region. Other pairings can be found in the right sidebar.

1. Quentin Tarantino ("Death Proof," "Inglourious Basterds") vs.
16. Michael Moore ("Sicko," "Capitalism: A Love Story")

8. Gus Van Sant ("Paranoid Park," "Milk") vs.
9. Terry Gilliam ("Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus")

5. David Lynch ("Inland Empire") vs.
12. Spike Jonze ("Where the Wild Things Are")

4. Wes Anderson ("The Darjeeling Limited," "Fantastic Mr. Fox") vs.
13. Ang Lee ("Brokeback Mountain")

6. David Fincher ("The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," "Zodiac") vs.
11. Michel Gondry ("Block Party," "Be Kind Rewind")

3. Darren Aronofsky ("The Wrestler," "The Fountain") vs.
14. Alexander Payne ("Sideways")

7. Steven Soderbergh ("Che," "The Girlfriend Experience," "The Informant!")
10. Hayao Miyazaki ("Ponyo")

2. Paul Thomas Anderson ("There Will Be Blood")
15. Richard Linklater ("A Scanner Darkly," "Me and Orson Welles")