Craig Brewer

With a terrific new movie called Song Sung Blue opening on Christmas day, writer-director Craig Brewer adds another bull's-eye to his filmography, which includes Hustle and Flow, the remake of Footloose, and Eddie Murphy's Dolemite is My Name. Although completely self-taught, he had a great mentor in the late John Singleton and an ability to glean the best lessons to be derived from reading all the film-related books he could while punching a clock at Barnes and Noble.