"The Godfather was one of those movies where, you know, I didn’t realize what it meant back then when I was younger, and you love it because it’s so gangster, in a way — it’s just as gangster as it gets. But then as you get older you realize it’s about something bigger. The Godfather‘s about choosing business over family; you know [in Part II] when Michael kills his brother in the boat, and you realize what that choice was. It really stuck with me, you know, the bigger picture of what this country was built on and the choices that were made. So that movie I love. And obviously there’s the look of it and everything; that’s just a beautiful film in many ways."

"I was tempted to replace this with Something Wild—along with Blue Velvet a key movie of the ’80s, when Demme was its finest mainstream director without a hit. But this is undeniably Demme’s greatest achievement—one of his only hits, and rumors persist that it was taken as a job. It contains maybe the most complexly realized heroine in a procedural and two of the most iconic performances in American movies. It seems Demme has been apologizing for its gore and violence ever since, but it’s a nearly perfect film while also a haunting reflection of the George H. W. Bush years in the same way The Coens’ No Country For Old Men seemed like a reflection of the waning years of his son’s presidency."

"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 favorite genre: movies that are for children that are not for children at all. (And when Mike Patton, with Fantômas, covered one of its songs on the band’s 2001 album, The Director’s Cut, an even darker veil was pulled over the film.) This film sends me back to summer nights down South, running through the woods long after the dinner bell rang. I’d freeze on the line between our glowing yellow porch light in front and the deeper woods behind. The compact blackness of those deeper woods terrified me, but it hypnotized me more. The Night of the Hunter’s river sequence and the title sequence of To Kill a Mockingbird are the truest portrayals of childhood that have ever been captured on film."

"Growing up, I had a poster of the mid-nineties Tony Todd remake of Night of the Living Dead hanging on my bedroom wall that I had gotten it from the local video store when they were planning on tossing it. I love the remake, but it was the original George Romero black-and-white film that made me want to be a storyteller. It made me want to be a horror movie makeup artist. Making movies looked like fun! And looking back, aside from all that, the film has a racial and social component that I think elevated it beyond the typical horror film. And it was cool to see a Latino last name in the credits, quite frankly."

"I watched Alien again, Ridley Scott’s movie, and I felt completely taken by it and distracted for a while. When I watched (it), I really wasn’t thinking about coronavirus – or our terrible president, or anything – I was focusing completely on what was going on in the movie and exclusively on the drama within (it). So I’d say (quarantine watching) can totally be entertainment, (but) just make sure that it actually takes your brain energy, you know? Like horror movies, or (films) that really (give) you anxiety, and happiness, and joy – everything because of the movie. It shouldn’t be that your mind can wander off, it can’t be too easy. Also, I’ve discovered that I can cook as well – that’s big to me."

"Wild Bunch, yeah. I’ve seen that as many times as I’ve seen any… it was just a great classic western. The wonderful characters — full of great character actors, you know: Warren Oates, Strother Martin, L.Q. Jones, William Holden, Robert Ryan — they’re just terrific. Just from the acting point of view, the whole shape of it was brilliant, and the story. It was violent and sexy and beautiful. And a fantastic narrative — ambitious and big. Impossible to imagine anyone doing it now, really. I’m a child of that, the Bonnie and Clyde to Raging Bull period, you know. Those are the films that heightened my interest in acting and movies and everything. But that’s the sort of classic of that period, I suppose."

"Both films reinvent what movies can do. What Rosi and Kiarostami do with Miguelín and Sabzian is such higher-power filmmaking, so modern, so romantic, and so influential. I saw The Moment of Truth in the theater through one of Janus’s runs of restored films. I remember the feeling in my stomach, the horrific beauty and love affair Miguelín had with the bulls and life itself. I remember the devastation and the constant reminder that Miguelín was actually Miguelín. The triumph of both films rests in their cinematic qualities; of course, Rosi surpasses Close-up here in portraying the moments of truth in Techniscope. Close-up is an utter masterpiece, and I didn’t feel the need to even bother writing about it. Like God."

"Both films reinvent what movies can do. What Rosi and Kiarostami do with Miguelín and Sabzian is such higher-power filmmaking, so modern, so romantic, and so influential. I saw The Moment of Truth in the theater through one of Janus’s runs of restored films. I remember the feeling in my stomach, the horrific beauty and love affair Miguelín had with the bulls and life itself. I remember the devastation and the constant reminder that Miguelín was actually Miguelín. The triumph of both films rests in their cinematic qualities; of course, Rosi surpasses Close-up here in portraying the moments of truth in Techniscope. Close-up is an utter masterpiece, and I didn’t feel the need to even bother writing about it. Like God."

"Ray Harryhausen is another inspiration to me. He did it all himself, too, you know, in the days when it was difficult to do that. In his characters — even the things that had no character — you could feel an artist at work there. You could feel his hand in it, and that’s rare, in any kind of film. His acting was better than the acting of the humans. It really tapped in to what I like about movies, I mean, the fantasy but also that handmade element, when you can see the movement of the characters — it’s like Frankenstein or Pinocchio, taking an inanimate object and having it come to life. That’s why I still like to do stop-motion projects."