A couple of recent examples: Rod Lurie was a film critic before he became a writer, director, and for a while, showrunner, in Hollywood. Amelie Gillette wrote a blog for the AV Club called The Hater, in which she trashed zillions of Hollywood movies and TV shows. She is now a writer for The Office.

Plenty of writers and directors have terrible things to say about each other's work, too. If that was enough to keep them from working, no one's agent would let him be on Twitter.

Amos, thanks for those. I knew about Lurie, but had totally forgotten that. Did not know about Gillette. That is very cool.

Don't forget about Paul Attanasio. And all those French new wave guys although that might be dated. I think George Wing too did some film writing for magazines as well. And I think Ryan Murphy was an entertainment writer of some sorts as well.

One of my favorite writer/directors Chan-wook Park started off writing film reviews and I remember reading that often being disappointed with films he reviewed, he channeled that disappointment into making movies he'd love.