"My final choice. This is really tough. Part of me wanted to say Dogville. Part of me wanted to say The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. And then part of me wanted to say Rosemary’s Baby. But I realized that I had to put an early Scorsese in there. I had a hard time choosing between Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, but I think it’s got to be Taxi Driver. I mean, from Bernard Hermann’s score to what Scorsese does with the camera with Michael Chapman. Yeah, it’s just like this sickly fever dream that captures a New York that I never got to see, but it just feels like New York to me. You know, the way that he kind of wrangled all of these very important influences that have nothing to do with one another. Like, there’s a lot of Bresson in there, but then there’s also Max Ophüls and there’s Fellini and there’s Cassavetes. You know, you see so many sources, but together they’ve become singularly Scorsese. I could put any number of Scorsese films in here. I could put Raging Bull, Goodfellas, The Age of Innocence, The King of Comedy, but right now this strikes me as like his toughest and most perfect film. Also, Bernard Hermann’s score is so persistent and so pervasive, it feels like a total montage, because that score is so driving. I’m not sure if there is another Scorsese film whose score is so integral. I mean, Cape Fear‘s score is all over it, but Taxi Driver is like top to bottom just Bernard Hermann music."

"The critics and the public wanted the pathos of M. Hulot’s Holiday and Mon oncle. They got Playtime, a comedy entirely devoted to space, in which Tati, as Hulot, hovers at the periphery of his own creation and has the elegance, which very few comedians share, not to put the spotlight on his own mug. The public and the critics turned against Tati. They were of course wrong, and the film is one of those few that get better by the year. It’s a silent film with sound; its color scheme is in a narrow band between gray and blue that aggressively underscores the painterly logic of Tati’s conceit. The film gives itself the luxury to reinvent choreography and as such dazzles with the megalomania of its enterprise and the diabolical precision the filmmaker had to conjure up to pull it off. There is ultimately so much to see, so many discrete pockets of activities in such a large canvas, that Tati has ensured that his film can be revisited time and again and each time seem different and new. It is a monumental film, literally and figuratively, that in its humorous take on modernity retains a form of hope. Alienation, but alienation light, and still the hope that the strategic social planning of architects and designers has cracks and will allow folks to run for daylight for the reassertion of their humanity. And, yes, a detail: the exquisite quality of this transfer is one of the reasons we spend our allowance on votive candles for the altar of Our Little Lady of the Criterion Collection."

"I love When Harry Met Sally. Every girl actress is like, “I’m looking for my Annie Hall.” But I’ve always looked for my Sally. That’s been my favorite. I prefer it, I have to say. I just think, again, it’s dry, it’s funny, the characters are layered and interesting. All the supporting characters in that film have great moments and great roles, and you remember every single one of them. It always makes me laugh, and I feel like it’s timeless. And who doesn’t fantasize about falling in love with their best friend? Isn’t that the whole point? And I loved all the intertwining stories of the old people, and their little stories of how they met and fell in love. What a great idea; it’s so cool. And, of course, Nora Ephron’s the best. And that famous scene where she has the fake orgasm — I mean, the balls of that performance. Just great, it’s really great. It’s also kind of grown-up. I remember watching it when I was younger, thinking, “God I hope I’m like them.” Now I’m so much older than they are. [laughs] But they all were moving to New York City to try to make it in Manhattan, so there was that element to it that I loved. And then the settling in, and realizing that life is different than you thought it would be. I just think it’s a perfect romantic comedy, and it is different than the usual formula, because you do have these sort of interstitial moments that are so funny, with these couples describing how they met and fell and love."