Film directors from Copenhagen

Rie Rasmussen (born 14 February 1978) is a Danish actress, film director, writer, model, and photographer.

Giancarlo Giuseppe Alessandro Esposito (born April 26, 1958) is a Danish-born American actor and director. He is best known for portraying Gus Fring in the AMC drama series Breaking Bad (2009–2011) and Better Call Saul (2017–present), for which he won a Critics' Choice Television Award and earned three nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series.

Lars von Trier (born Lars Trier; 30 April 1956) is a Danish film director and screenwriter with a prolific and controversial career spanning almost four decades. His work is known for its genre and technical innovation, confrontational examination of existential, social, and political issues, and his treatment of subjects such as mercy, sacrifice, and mental health.

Joachim Trier (born 1 March 1974) is a Norwegian film director raised in Oslo, Norway. His father, Jacob Trier, was the sound technician of The Pinchcliffe Grand Prix, a notable film produced in Norway in 1975.

Susanne Bier (born 15 April 1960) is a Danish film director, screenwriter, and producer. She is best known for her feature films Brothers (2004), After the Wedding (2006), In a Better World (2010), and Bird Box (2018), and the TV miniseries The Night Manager on AMC and The Undoing on HBO. Bier is the first female director to win a Golden Globe Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and a European Film Award, collectively.

Mikael Salomon (born 24 February 1945) is a Danish cinematographer, director and producer of film and television. After a long cinematography career in Danish cinema, he transitioned to the Hollywood film industry in the late 1980s earning two Academy Award nominations. He is also a television director whose credits include dozens of series, films and miniseries including Band of Brothers, Salem's Lot, Rome, and The Andromeda Strain. His awards and nominations include a Primetime Emmy Award and a Directors Guild of America Award.

Christian Tafdrup (born 8 April 1978) is a Danish actor, film director, and screenwriter. As a director, he is best known for his directorial debut Parents (2016) that won the 2017 Robert Award for Best Director, as well as his critically acclaimed psychological thriller horror drama Speak No Evil (2022).

Nicolas Winding Refn (born 29 September 1970) is a Danish film director, screenwriter, and producer. He is known for directing the Pusher trilogy (1996–2005), the fictionalised biographical film Bronson (2008), the adventure film Valhalla Rising (2009), the action drama film Drive (2011), the crime film Only God Forgives (2013), the psychological horror film The Neon Demon (2016), and the crime series Too Old to Die Young (2019).

Lone Scherfig (born 2 May 1959) is a Danish film director and screenwriter who has been involved with the Dogme 95 film movement and who has been widely critically acclaimed for several of her movies, including the Oscar-nominated film An Education (2009). Scherfig's movies are generally romantic comedies, including her film One Day (2011), based on the David Nicholls novel. Through both experimenting with creative constraints and her astute attention to detail, she has come to be recognized as a significant talent in the film industry.

Thomas Vinterberg (born 19 May 1969) is a Danish film director who, along with Lars von Trier, co-founded the Dogme 95 movement in filmmaking, which established rules for simplifying movie production. He is best known for the films The Celebration (1998), Submarino (2010), The Hunt (2012), Far from the Madding Crowd (2015), and Another Round (2020). For Another Round, he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director (the first Danish filmmaker nominated for the Best Director category) and won the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film.