The Empire Award for Best British Director was an Empire Award that was presented by Empire magazine to British directors working in the motion picture industry from the 2nd Empire Awards

2nd Empire Awards

The 2nd Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 1996, were held on 1997. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners. Winners are highlighted in bold.-External links:*...

 in 1997 until the 6th Empire Awards

6th Empire Awards

The 6th Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 2000, were held on February, 2001 at The Dorchester Hotel and hosted by Dermot O'Leary. It was broadcast on Channel 4. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners...

 in 2001. The award was brought back for one year for the 10th Empire Awards in 2005. The winners were chosen each year by readers of Empire magazine.

Winners and nominees

In the list below, winners are listed first in bold, followed by the other nominees. The number of the ceremony (1st, 2nd, etc.) appears in parentheses after the awards year, linked to the article (if any) on that ceremony.

1990s

Year	Director	Film
1997 (2nd) 2nd Empire Awards The 2nd Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 1996, were held on 1997. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners. Winners are highlighted in bold.-External links:*...
	Danny Boyle Danny Boyle Daniel "Danny" Boyle is an English filmmaker and producer. He is best known for his work on films such as Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours, 28 Days Later, Sunshine and Trainspotting. For Slumdog Millionaire, Boyle won numerous awards in 2008, including the Academy Award for Best Director...	Trainspotting Trainspotting (film) Trainspotting is a 1996 British satirical/drama film directed by Danny Boyle based on the novel of the same name by Irvine Welsh. The movie follows a group of heroin addicts in a late 1980s economically depressed area of Edinburgh and their passage through life...
1998 (3rd) 3rd Empire Awards The 3rd Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 1997, were held on 1998. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners. Winners are highlighted in bold.-Best British Director:Anthony Minghella — The English Patient-External links:*...
	Anthony Minghella Anthony Minghella Anthony Minghella, CBE was an English film director, playwright and screenwriter. He was Chairman of the Board of Governors at the British Film Institute between 2003 and 2007....	The English Patient The English Patient (film) The English Patient is a 1996 romantic drama film based on the novel of the same name by Sri Lankan-Canadian writer Michael Ondaatje. The film, written for the screen and directed by Anthony Minghella, won nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture...
1999 (4th) 4th Empire Awards The 4th Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 1998, were held on 1999. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners. Winners are highlighted in bold.-Best Film:Titanic*Good Will Hunting*Saving Private Ryan...
	Peter Howitt Peter Howitt Peter Howitt is an English actor and film director. He grew up in Eltham, London and Bromley, Kent, Peter used to be a part of the Priory Players in the Priory behind Christ Church, Eltham. He studied at the Drama Studio London. He has two children, Luke and Amy...	Sliding Doors Sliding Doors Sliding Doors is a 1998 British-American romantic comedy-drama film written and directed by Peter Howitt and starring Gwyneth Paltrow and John Hannah, and featured John Lynch, Jeanne Tripplehorn and Virginia McKenna. The music was composed by David Hirschfelder...
	Guy Ritchie Guy Ritchie Guy Stuart Ritchie is an English screenwriter and film maker who directed Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch, Revolver, RocknRolla and Sherlock Holmes.-Early life:...	Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels is a 1998 British crime film directed and written by Guy Ritchie. The story is a heist film involving a self-confident young card sharp who loses £500,000 to a powerful crime lord in a rigged game of three card brag...
	Ken Loach Ken Loach Kenneth "Ken" Loach is a Palme D'Or winning English film and television director.He is known for his naturalistic, social realist directing style and for his socialist beliefs, which are evident in his film treatment of social issues such as homelessness , labour rights and child abuse at the...	My Name Is Joe My Name Is Joe My Name Is Joe is a 1998 Scottish film directed by Ken Loach. The film stars Peter Mullan as Joe Kavanagh, an unemployed recovering alcoholic in Glasgow who meets and falls in love with a health visitor. David McKay plays his troubled friend Liam...
	Nick Hamm	Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel and Laurence Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel and Laurence Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel and Laurence is a 1998 British romantic comedy directed by Nick Hamm...
	Shane Meadows Shane Meadows Shane Meadows is an English film director, screenwriter, occasional actor and BAFTA winner.-Background:Meadows grew up in the Westlands Road area of Uttoxeter, Staffordshire. His father was a long distance lorry driver and his mother worked in a fish and chip shop...	24/7 Twenty Four Seven (film) Twenty Four Seven is a 1997 film directed and written by Shane Meadows. It was co-written by frequent Meadows collaborator Paul Fraser.-Plot:In a typical English working-class town, the juveniles have nothing more to do than hang around in gangs...

2000s

Year	Director	Film
2000 (5th) 5th Empire Awards The 5th Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 1999, were held on February 17, 2000 at the Park Lane Hotel. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners. Winners are highlighted in bold.-Best Debut:...
	Roger Michell Roger Michell Roger Michell is an English theatre, television and film director.-Personal life:He was born in Pretoria, South Africa but spent significant parts of his childhood in Beirut, Damascus and Prague as his father was a diplomat. He was educated at Clifton College where he became a member of Brown's...	Notting Hill Notting Hill (film) Notting Hill is a 1999 British romantic comedy film set in Notting Hill, London, released on 21 May 1999. The screenplay was by Richard Curtis, who had written Four Weddings and a Funeral. It was produced by Duncan Kenworthy and directed by Roger Michell...
2001 (6th) 6th Empire Awards The 6th Empire Awards, honoring the best in film in 2000, were held on February, 2001 at The Dorchester Hotel and hosted by Dermot O'Leary. It was broadcast on Channel 4. Below is a complete list of nominees and winners...
	Guy Ritchie Guy Ritchie Guy Stuart Ritchie is an English screenwriter and film maker who directed Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch, Revolver, RocknRolla and Sherlock Holmes.-Early life:...	Snatch Snatch (film) Snatch is a 2000 crime film written and directed by British filmmaker Guy Ritchie, featuring an ensemble cast. Set in the London criminal underworld, the film contains two intertwined plots: one dealing with the search for a stolen diamond, the other with a small-time boxing promoter named Turkish ...
	Nick Park Nick Park Nicholas Wulstan "Nick" Park, CBE is an English filmmaker of stop motion animation best known as the creator of Wallace and Gromit and Shaun the Sheep....  and Peter Lord Peter Lord Peter Lord CBE is a British film producer, director and co-founder of the Academy award-winning Aardman Animations studio, an animation firm best known for its clay animated films and shorts, particularly those featuring plasticine duo Wallace & Gromit.-Biography:In cooperation with David...	Chicken Run Chicken Run Chicken Run is a 2000 British stop-motion animation film made by the Aardman Animations studios, the production studio of the Oscar-winning Wallace and Gromit films...
	Ridley Scott Ridley Scott Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...	Gladiator Gladiator (2000 film) Gladiator is a 2000 historical epic film directed by Ridley Scott, starring Russell Crowe, Joaquin Phoenix, Connie Nielsen, Ralf Möller, Oliver Reed, Djimon Hounsou, Derek Jacobi, John Shrapnel and Richard Harris. Crowe portrays the loyal Roman General Maximus Decimus Meridius, who is betrayed...
	Sam Mendes Sam Mendes Samuel Alexander "Sam" Mendes, CBE is an English stage and film director. He is best known for his Academy Award-winning work on his debut film American Beauty and his dark re-inventions of the stage musicals Cabaret , Oliver! , Company and Gypsy . He's currently working on the 23rd James Bond...	American Beauty American Beauty (film) American Beauty is a 1999 American drama film directed by Sam Mendes and written by Alan Ball. Kevin Spacey stars as Lester Burnham, a middle-aged magazine writer who has a midlife crisis when he becomes infatuated with his teenage daughter's best friend, Angela...
	Stephen Daldry Stephen Daldry Stephen David Daldry, CBE is an English theatre and film director and producer, as well as a three-time Academy Award nominated and Tony Award winning director.-Early years:...	Billy Elliot Billy Elliot Billy Elliot is a 2000 British drama film written by Lee Hall and directed by Stephen Daldry. Set in the fictional town of "Everington" in the real County Durham, UK, it stars Jamie Bell as 11-year-old Billy, an aspiring dancer, Gary Lewis as his coal miner father, Jamie Draven as Billy's older...
2005 (10th)
	Matthew Vaughn Matthew Vaughn Matthew Vaughn is an English film producer and director known for producing such films as Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch and directing the films Layer Cake , Stardust and Kick-Ass...	Layer Cake Layer Cake (film) Layer Cake is a 2004 British crime thriller produced and directed by Matthew Vaughn, in his directorial debut. It is based on the novel Layer Cake by J. J...
	Edgar Wright Edgar Wright Edgar Howard Wright is an English film and television director and writer. He is most famous for his work with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost on the films Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, the TV series Spaced, and for directing the film Scott Pilgrim vs...	Shaun of the Dead Shaun of the Dead Shaun of the Dead is a 2004 British zombie comedy directed by Edgar Wright, starring Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, and written by Pegg and Wright. Pegg plays Shaun, a man attempting to get some kind of focus in his life as he deals with his girlfriend, his mother and stepfather...
	Paul Greengrass Paul Greengrass Paul Greengrass is an English film director, screenwriter and former journalist. He specialises in dramatisations of real-life events and is known for his signature use of hand-held cameras.-Life and career:...	The Bourne Supremacy The Bourne Supremacy (film) The Bourne Supremacy is a 2004 American spy film very loosely based on Robert Ludlum's novel of the same name. The film was directed by Paul Greengrass, written by Tony Gilroy and Brian Helgeland, and produced by Frank Marshall and Pat Crowley. Universal Pictures released the film to theaters in...
	Roger Michell Roger Michell Roger Michell is an English theatre, television and film director.-Personal life:He was born in Pretoria, South Africa but spent significant parts of his childhood in Beirut, Damascus and Prague as his father was a diplomat. He was educated at Clifton College where he became a member of Brown's...	Enduring Love
	Shane Meadows Shane Meadows Shane Meadows is an English film director, screenwriter, occasional actor and BAFTA winner.-Background:Meadows grew up in the Westlands Road area of Uttoxeter, Staffordshire. His father was a long distance lorry driver and his mother worked in a fish and chip shop...	Dead Man's Shoes