In the past 10 years alone, he's turned out a nightmare-fuelling psychological horror, a shattering arthouse disaster movie, a fluffy Danish office comedy, an experimental documentary on the nature of creative endeavour and the first two parts of a trilogy about American culpability.
Overnight, the Costa Concordia disaster shattered the image of the most durably successful travel sector.
The disaster shattered families, homes and finances and laid new burdens on Haitian immigrants supporting relatives back home.
Sadly, this idyllic retirement was shattered by a disaster even greater than that which had ended his first career.
The widespread conviction in the first case that "the world will be better than ever" was totally shattered by the disaster of 9/11.
Tougher safety rules by the Nuclear Regulation Authority, the country's new nuclear watchdog, were supposed to have restored public faith shattered by the disaster at Fukushima.
The March 2011 Fukushima disaster shattered the public's faith in the "safety myth" surrounding nuclear energy, which once accounted for almost 30% of Japan's energy needs, with plans to raise its share to about half with the construction of more reactors.
The Gulf Coast disaster shattered all our previous conceptions.
Yes, Gordon Brown's moral and political authority has been shattered by the disasters of the last two weeks, but the real revelation has been the intellectual vacuum exposed by April's budget.
