His first, The Builder (2010), featured co-writer Colm O'Leary in his debut performance as an Irish immigrant struggling to reconcile the American ideal and its manifestation in the real world.

Premiering at Rotterdam Film Festival, New Jerusalem (2011), his second feature, starring Colm O'Leary and Will Oldham, again considered the immigrant experience, this time through the lens of religious ideology.

The Comedy (2012), a departure from the subtle form and subject matter of Alverson’s previous films, starred cult-comic Tim Heidecker in his first dramatic role.

[11] Set in early 1950s America, the film stars Tye Sheridan, Jeff Goldblum, Hannah Gross, Udo Kier and Denis Lavant[12] and is loosely based on the American neurologist Walter Freeman's fall from grace after the procedure he invented, the lobotomy, came under scrutiny.

Alverson has directed music videos for Sharon Van Etten, Angel Olsen, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Benjamin Booker, Strand of Oaks, Night Beds, Gregor Samsa and Oneohtrix Point Never.