"My parents took me to see it in a re-release — it came out in the ’60s and they re-released it in the early ’70s — and I was only seven years old, so it totally blew my mind. My parents, I think, were just completely bored and baffled by it, but I was obsessed with it. It stuck in my head, and every time it came on television I would watch it, and I saw it again in the theater as a teenager; I would go to see it whenever they revived it. It was just a movie I’ve watched a lot. I think part of the reason is…when I was a kid, I didn’t know what to make of it. It was so unlike what I’d been exposed to on TV, or by watching Disney films in the theater. It was so fascinating to me. It has a really unique status, which is in my mind like a big Hollywood epic movie about esoteric ideas — which had never really happened before that, and I don’t think it’s going to happen again. No one would ever spend that kind of money on a movie that big, and with that scope, and be that strange and slow and oblique and unexplained. Some people, of course, think it’s incredibly pretentious; I think the ideas in it are really fascinating. That Kubrick meticulousness is incredible. But part of what makes it a great movie, I think, is that as it proceeds it turns into this really intimate kind of horror-thriller — with HAL — and when I think, “Who’s a great writer who wrote in that style?,” I think Edgar Allan Poe in outer space. It becomes this real, psychological, bizarre, unexplainable thing about a murdering supercomputer! Those are some of the most handsome, greatest, cinematic scenes I’ve ever seen, so the fact that it was attached to this esoteric thing… To me, it works on so many levels. And the design, and the use of music…there’s nothing else quite like it."

"It’s the first Fellini film I ever saw, so I think it’s my favorite. My Italian relatives always told me we were distantly related to Fellini—not sure if there is any truth in that, but that’s one of the reasons we went to see it. “Oh yeah, he’s our cousin,” they would say. Growing up with Italians, you see that life is absurd: it’s a circus, with some sex in it, and Amarcord simply confirmed that for me. I can watch this movie again and again; it’s that enjoyable. And although some scenes are over the top—and yes, Fellini is obsessed with big-bottomed women and very large breasts—it’s a movie about his childhood. And by learning about his childhood, I learned to appreciate my own. When I was young, I spent every summer with my Italian relatives in Astoria, Queens. Here’s what I learned: every day is a drama, and it all ends with everyone laughing and drinking wine and eating spaghetti. There was an unbelievable tale to be heard about every third cousin. Somebody would whisper, “That’s Rose—the day her mother died, her face froze into a scowl. And that’s why she looks like that.” We never questioned these things. Listening to stories was part of the immigrant experience. Amarcord feels that way. Fellini is telling stories about people in his village, but I related to all the stories. This was a movie my Italian relatives took me to, that they wanted to see so they could see themselves and laugh. I think that by watching how much they enjoyed the movie, I began to understand and appreciate my own culture for the first time. Watching Amarcord was also the first time I experienced the music of the great Nino Rota. When you think of Fellini, you always think of the music, which acts as the perfect bridge between the stories. I challenge anyone to see this film and not want to make love. Amarcord means “I remember.” You will remember."

"""Alright, I’d say the first would have to be Goodfellas. I know that’s probably one you get a lot, but I remember it came out, and I was probably in about the 8th grade. Me and my buddy Dougie Thornel probably saw that at the theaters 30 times. I mean we would just go, and we would watch it, and then sit in the theater and watch it again. I can’t say enough good about it. It’s horrifying, it’s hilarious, it’s so unbelievably honest. Look, I mean, Scorsese is my favorite filmmaker. You know, the fact that I got the chance to work with him [on The Wolf of Wall Street] was sort of the mountaintop, the kind of crowning achievement of my career, and I don’t mean that in sort of how I’m perceived by the world. I just mean in terms of experience. My brief time on that movie really changed the way that I work as an actor. He’s one of these guys that makes you feel that anything is possible. I’ve studied in the Russian theater, and one of the main ways that we study was you get a scene and then you do a big improvisation about the scene and what the scene could be. That’s precisely how he worked. Each one of these scenes, you create this unbelievably vivid reality, you really take yourself to the place, and everybody feels like they are one hundred feet tall. It doesn’t matter whether you are background or whether you are craft services or anything, but everybody is so full of ideas. You make it on the day, and then he just sort of takes what he wants from that. I feel like that method of filmmaking that’s so Scorsese, so uniquely his, shines brightest in that movie. That sense of anything can happen at anytime, it’s happening right there in the moment. I think it really, really just shines brightest in that film, and that’s why it’s my favorite film."""

"I really love Bicycle Thief. That just reminds me of my relationship with my father. My mother — they were divorced and I was raised mostly by my father. We grew up really poor. Something about that film really strikes a chord in me real deep. I remember [when I first saw it],I think I was in college and I had just left home. It was part of film studies class. We were told to watch it and I remember getting really emotional watching it. I guess it just really struck a chord because it made me realize everything my father had gone through to support us and to be there for us. I just remember that relationship, that father/son relationship and him loving his father so much and the end — his father just constantly trying so hard to support the family and make ends meet, and really not being able to pull it off. Poverty sucks, you know what I mean? And then in the end, him having to kind of resort to something that goes completely against his character, really, in order to provide for his family. And those moments of just pure humiliation, as a man, to try to provide for your family. I remember times like that with my dad and it just really hit close to home. I remember missing my dad because I was in New York. I was away from home for the first time and getting a real clear idea of what my father had gone through to provide for me. I think when you’re in the day-to-day and living it, you don’t have that objectivity, and you’re not able to step back and see the big picture. Then sometimes these really great movies are able to that for you. They’re kind of able to strike these chords in you and illuminate things for you. I think that’s what the Bicycle Thief did for me."

"I don’t know why because I’m almost never in Los Angeles, but I went to the premiere of Knocked Up. Some cousin of Judd Apatow‘s was going to propose to his girlfriend, but was shy, so what Judd did was brought up the cousin and his girlfriend onto stage and Jack Black hid behind, knelt on the floor behind the cousin, and very noisily proposed to her. So the first time I saw the film I was in a very good mood having had such a brilliant start. But Knocked Up, like The Hangover which is also wonderful, is full of really really funny things; particularly the friends. When that group of friends is together, everyone has a sort of weird idiosyncratic joke which is perfectly expressed every time they appear, from the guy with the beard downwards. There are so many other funny things — when Kristen Wiig is rude to Katherine Heigl when she gets her job, and she’s going on about how lucky she is to get the job, it’s completely hilarious. Both Seth Rogen and Katherine are so charming and funny, and it’s so modern, on the edge and hard; a real romantic film. I think that if romantic comedies are meant to be romantic and funny, then that’s a perfect example. It’s very relaxed and at ease with itself, and doesn’t try too hard, or doesn’t seem to be trying very hard, and I think that’s very much to do with how Judd makes his movies. I’m sure he knows exactly what he wants, but it does have a slightly improvisational edge to it, because he does work with people that he knows very well, so there’s a naturalness to it, and I think it’s a great modern film. I haven’t seen Funny People yet, but I have very high hopes for it, I’m looking forward to it a great deal."