"Magical realism is very important to me, and here you have some wonderful fantasy sequences—including Roy Scheider talking to Death, played by Jessica Lange. And there’s so much humor in this movie. It’s very serious on one level, because the protagonist is reflecting on his own mortality and the constant presence of death in his life, but it’s also very funny. Even when the hero is having a heart attack, the movie can’t help but break into a bit of musical theater! And as someone who used to dance before becoming a filmmaker, I’m in love with the choreography—how Scheider watches it all happening and participates in it, and how sexy it is. The dancing is very of the period—it’s maybe even a little dated—but the movie itself is not. It completely holds up."

"I don’t think I would name films as much as I would name filmmakers. You have to have a Frank Capra movie, you’d have to have a John Ford movie, and you’d have to have a Steven Spielberg movie in there. And then as a specific film, Pan’s Labyrinth would have to be in my Top Five. Because what Gabriel García Márquez was to fiction, that movie is to cinema. It’s magical realism, and it’s something that can only exist cinematically. It cannot be confused with any other medium. That makes it the perfect film. It’s also unlike anything you’ve ever seen before or will see again, it’s completely unique and not derivative, and it’s brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Setting fascist Spain — or fascist anything, for that matter –against this fantasy world created by this perfect, pristine, beautiful, pure girl."