"Growing up in a Southern Baptist home, I was hesitant to read a fictional account of Jesus’ adult life, his own family relations, and the introduction of a romantic relationship. I know the ending to this story, so what could I possibly learn? However, my curiosity got the best of me, and I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I loved how the author humanized Jesus in a way I hadn’t seen him described before. I knew about his adoration for his mother, his intense sense of responsibility and his steadfast purpose, but I had never considered the down to earth humanity within those qualities: the love of laughter, warm interpersonal connections with siblings, and day-to-day decision-making. The other fascinating character was, of course, his love interest Ana. You see Jesus through this strong, feisty woman’s eyes and cannot help but weep with her when she loses her greatest love. As this historical moment that I had faithfully studied for all of my life unfolded, I was so involved in the story that I forgot everything aside from the passion, love and sacrifice these two figures shared. Sue Monk Kidd provides the ultimate gift that any writer has to offer their reader: the ability to climb inside the hearts and minds of her characters, feel their pain and celebrate their love. What an experience."

"Léon. Or, as it’s known in the United States, The Professional. But in France it’s called Léon. It’s so weird because for years I’d always called it The Professional and then for some reason it switched in my mind. I mean, that movie was an amazing blend of an international eye within the context of an American… That movie still feels extremely international, certainly with its lead actor but also the way that it was shot and made. But at the heart of that film is this incredible relationship between a cold blooded killer and a young girl. And it’s still so effective and so powerful. I think one of my favorite sequences in the film was when the two of them are kind of like, it’s like this beautiful montage of their relationship as they’re, like, cleaning the apartment and these sort of things that they’re doing together, this really adorable, emotional relationship. And it’s all cut to “Venus as a Boy” by Björk. It’s such a great sequence and there’s such whimsy to their connection. And of course the movie goes into a really dark and awfully sort of tragic place, you know, and it’s really about a man whose sole purpose in life is to be cold and calculated, but it’s all about this girl finding his humanity. It’s just such a beautiful film."

"Melville is a very, very dear filmmaker for me because I feel he suffers when he’s making a movie. He puts a lot of effort into it. I have a feeling that it doesn’t flow very naturally, but that’s exactly what I like, that he’s working and putting in so much of his own feelings and vision in a way that’s complicated for him. In Le silence de la mer, which is one of my favorite films ever, he creates this feeling of intimacy not through dialogue but through a space, a certain type of light, and the sounds of a specific place. How is it that, with a film, he can make you feel the weight of a living room and the solace it can give? It’s all about nostalgia and reminds me of the way I think of places in the past. I can imagine that Melville must have been an intense and passionate person, especially given how he deals with the past and his memories. Army of Shadows is done very intellectually and very elegantly. He’s always so classical—not in the sense of rules but in the sense of proportions and elegance, like something Greek and old. That’s a quality that belongs to people who were living during the Second World War, people from another era with an aspiration for a better humanity."

"Melville is a very, very dear filmmaker for me because I feel he suffers when he’s making a movie. He puts a lot of effort into it. I have a feeling that it doesn’t flow very naturally, but that’s exactly what I like, that he’s working and putting in so much of his own feelings and vision in a way that’s complicated for him. In Le silence de la mer, which is one of my favorite films ever, he creates this feeling of intimacy not through dialogue but through a space, a certain type of light, and the sounds of a specific place. How is it that, with a film, he can make you feel the weight of a living room and the solace it can give? It’s all about nostalgia and reminds me of the way I think of places in the past. I can imagine that Melville must have been an intense and passionate person, especially given how he deals with the past and his memories. Army of Shadows is done very intellectually and very elegantly. He’s always so classical—not in the sense of rules but in the sense of proportions and elegance, like something Greek and old. That’s a quality that belongs to people who were living during the Second World War, people from another era with an aspiration for a better humanity."

"Next up is There Will Be Blood. I gotta say, Paul Thomas Anderson might be the best working director alive. There Will Be Blood was such an interesting balance of showing why Daniel Plainview prospered in the oil rush of California. But it also shows how he’s essentially decrepit as a human being. He’s almost rotting away. He’s losing sight of his own humanity. It’s about dehumanization. Even outside of how gorgeous it looks, especially when the fire ignites the oil derrick and then the camera is rushing in. It’s a low angle tracking shot following Plainview as he’s rushing toward the fire. The colors in that scene are literally just dumbfounding. But the biggest thing is performance, performance, performance, performance, performance! Daniel Day-Lewis is amazing, and Paul Dano as the pastor is freaking insane. Insane! And his dynamic with Daniel Plainview is some of the most compelling s–t I’ve seen on film. The fact that Plainview views Paul Dano’s character as a necessary mechanism to control the people in the town, but he doesn’t give him any bit of respect; Plainview doesn’t believe a lick of what Dano is saying in those church services. But he feels it’s important for the people in the town that are working day in and day out for him to believe it. It’s such an interesting dynamic."