Brad Bird

In The Iron Giant, a giant metal machine comes down outside a Maine town in 1957 and a nine-year-old boy makes friends with it. Bird draws action with real weight and clear geography: a rat running a Paris restaurant kitchen in Ratatouille, a suburb of retired superheroes in The Incredibles trying to hold still. His people are the ones who are exceptional at something and bored by everything else, pushing against a world that would rather they were ordinary. You always know where everyone is standing, even when the room is coming apart.

Signature

• Action geography kept legible from the first shot to the last.
• Mid-century modern and retro-futurist design.
• Exceptional talent rubbing against conformity.
• A family argument running underneath the spectacle.