David Lowery

"I think about this film all the time. It has a real nice shape to it. The final shot is a terrifying portent, but for some reason I find it oddly hopeful. It's a useful jumping-off point when I’m thinking about what I want people to get out of my own movies."

"I saw this movie in Cincinnati right before I began shooting a new film, which was a terrible thing – because I couldn't get it out of my head and found myself spending too much time thinking about it and not on the work I had at hand. It's a real mystery of a movie, and I don't think I'll ever quite figure it out. Nor would I want to. If my new movie suffers, I'll hold Olivier Assayas partially accountable for making something so wonderful."

"The restoration of this film came along right when I needed to be reminded of the difference between simplicity and minimalism. This one (and its follow-ups) are as simple as can be and as full to bursting as a movie can get."

"Male ego, profoundly self-flagellated! This is such a work of in-spite-of-its-self-ness that it achieves an untowards level of sincerity."

"This adaptation of one of my favorite novels is hilarious, sweeping, exuberant and nearly perfect, because Sally Potter uses her cinema the same way Woolf used words: playfully, swoon-worthily, sharp as a tack."

"I was at Sundance for 36 hours this year and this was one of two movies I wasn’t going to leave without seeing. Lots of friends worked with Lynne Ramsey on this one, and told me tales of the production, and in other cases I can usually see such stories in the finished products. But not this one. This was its own untouchable thing, hovering far above from whatever means it took to make it, barely there and unbearably heavy at the very same time. I went to see it a second time opening weekend, and then listened to the score repeatedly until the movie itself was released on iTunes, at which point I let it become background music, playing on a loop as I drift around the house, hoping to subconsciously siphon off some of that tough magic."

"“Free Solo” is the rock climbing documentary du jour, and for very just cause. But Alex Honnold’s climbing partner Tommy Caldwell is also the subject of his own documentary, about a different historic ascent of El Capitan. It was directed by Josh Lowell and Peter Mortimer, and was released almost simultaneously with “Free Solo,” and thus hasn’t gotten the attention it deserves. I saw it at its premiere at SXSW in March, at which the entire audience erupted into a standing ovation – during the movie! I couldn’t help but go back for an encore screening a few nights later, which I think is the first time I’ve ever seen a movie twice at a film festival. While Honnold’s achievement is certainly more historic, Caldwell’s unbelievable life story and his accent of the titular wall with Kevin Jorgensen makes for one of the most triumphant feel-great narratives I’ve seen in years. I would recommend watching both docs, back to back, and then joining a climbing gym."

"I watched this for the first time at noon on September 28th. I remember the date very well, because it was the same day my own film opened in theaters, an event far less notable to me than finally getting to lay eyes on Luca Guadagino’s remake of one of my all-time favorite horror movies. I was beside myself with excitement. The lights went down in that little subterranean screening room and it didn’t take long for the film to confound every one of my expectations. What did I think I was getting myself into? Something lithely sensual? A blend of horror and eroticism? Any male-gaze-ish expectations I might have had were thwarted early on when Madame Blanc asks Suzie Bannion what it felt like when she performed one of her famous dances. “Like fucking,” says Suzie. “A man?” Blank asks, but Suzie shakes her head. “I was thinking an animal.” Just like that, the movie slapped some sense into me, and then it proceeded to keep slapping me, harder and harder, until it ended and I didn’t know what to think anymore other than that I wanted to watch it again right away. I had to wait until Halloween night. It wasn’t enough. A friend who saw an early cut told me that it was a whole lot of movie. It surely is, and my arms aren’t being enough to hug all of it."