"I grew up not understanding racism — I was never around anything that would have led me to that. All of a sudden I went to the premiere of this film and it struck me so hard. It made me brothers with my fellow man more than any other film that I’ve ever seen. It changed my life. The perspective it gave me was incredible. I don’t have a lot of films that changed my life, but that one made me realize we’re all in this together. Michael Pena is a good friend of mine, and this was the first film that put him on the map. He was so good. When the lights went down in that movie, we were taken away. It was unreal."

"To look at Mick Jagger’s creative output today, working hard to suggest the dynamism of his early career, you may wonder what it is he is straining to return to. This film offers an answer. Rock and roll, particularly British rock of the late sixties and early seventies, featured pioneering, Dionysian front men who lured their fans, male and female, into a bacchanal of sex, drugs, and blistering music. Those gatherings were often combustible. In this case, tragic. The remarkable Maysles brothers and Ms. Zwerin fashion a kind of cinematic, pop Warren Commission of the Altamont Speedway concert/crime scene. You don’t need drugs to get high watching the Stones at their peak. The band, and especially Jagger, are a drug."

"I have to go with a Coen brothers movie, because they are my inspiration as producers, filmmakers — I want to direct soon. Again, I think that Fargo is a nearly perfect film. Visually, comedically; it manages to be tense, and it’s smart. I love the fact that it’s based on somewhat of a true story — I think that’s kind of where my interests lie, the idea of doing a true crime story that’s darkly comedic; that’s something that really appeals to me. I could name several of their films, but Fargo is the one that just… I always think about that shot in the parking lot in the snow, when he’s just trying to scrape the window off and he just loses his mind. [laughs]"

"Salvatore Giuliano was my first introduction to Rosi’s work and today remains my absolute favorite of his films. It is the film that taught me that historical and political films don’t necessarily need to be didactic and lacking in tension and narrative energy. It is a film that explores the many shades of an incredibly important moment in Italian history, without judgment and without an overt agenda, and that is something I have always valued in cinema. Among the writers on the film is Suso Cecchi D’Amico, who coauthored some of my favorite films, including The Leopard, Bicycle Thieves, and Rocco and His Brothers. She is also credited on a film I hope Criterion will release in the future, Scorsese’s My Voyage to Italy."

"W. C. Fields, with wife, mother-in-law, child, daughter, and son-in-law, played by the wonderful Grady Sutton. All this is pure enjoyment. When were movies ever more alive than in the thirties, when the great performers from the musical and vaudeville stage entered films? W. C. Fields, the Marx Brothers, Mae West, Maurice Chevalier, Fred Astaire, Marie Dressler, Mickey Rooney, and Judy Garland, among so many others. They were the real authors of their films, needing little help from their directors. American films began with audiences wanting to see performers, not directors, and this, perhaps, continues to separate American films from European films, but we’re lucky to have both, and who’s to say which is really better."

"My second favorite film, I would probably say my most favorite documentary of all time, is a film called Brother’s Keeper by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky. Those are the same guys who did Paradise Lost and Metallica: Some Kind of Monster. Brother’s Keeper is this amazing film about a brother who was murdered, and it’s this omniscient journey as the murder gets uncovered and the investigation is happening. You know, they take one of the brothers to court, and the story just unfolds in front of you in a way that’s so twisted and bizarre and weird. This, for me, represents what a great documentary does. It just kind of unfolds in front of you in a way you can’t expect."