"Terrence Malick is the preeminent practicing metaphysician of the cinema. In his brilliant and haunting first feature, he tells the story of a vicious young serial killer and his impassive underage girlfriend, both perfectly rendered by Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek. The violence unfolds in the context of a vastly uncaring natural world and is relayed to us by the girl through a detached narration utterly innocent of emotion. The result is not a moral inquiry into human action but rather a compelling meditation on the nature of being itself."

"Robert Altman really deserves his own number and section, so I am tying three of his films. He was one of the rare filmmakers experimenting with form within the Hollywood system. He infused his work with fluid zooms to easily enter in and out of spaces and made social interactions feel more organic. He also used sound in experimental ways, pushing the form with overlapping dialogue. It’s so impressive that a studio funded an entire film based on a fever dream he had, starring two of my favorite actresses, Shelley Duvall and Sissy Spacek."

"Little Linda Manz’s voice-over is enough of a reason to watch this film. Forget the perfect performances by Richard Gere and Sam Shepard, or Brooke Adams’s twisted damsel in distress, or the way the wheat blows at magic hour making you forget the specter of murder that hangs over it all. I’m obsessed with the fact that production designer Jack Fisk built the farmhouse, which is meant to look as old as time and it really does. Also, while shooting Badlands (the previous Malick), Fisk wooed his future wife, Sissy Spacek, by leaving gifts for her in her character’s drawers. Swoon."

"I was excited that I had the chance to sing something in [happythankyoumoreplease]. I did a lot when I was younger and I haven’t in such a long time, but I grew up doing musicals and musical theater. That was my real passion and I soon as I started doing films, when I was 14, I did less. I would love to do movie musicals or Broadway. [A music biopic] would be a dream of mine… that leads into my favorite movies. Coal Miner’s Daughter is my all-time favorite movie. A lot of that has to do with that’s just a dream sort of ideal role for me. I love country music. I love the idea of playing a country singer and the whole thing, I love it. And I love Sissy Spacek. So yeah, that’s one of my favorites."

"Having lost Robert Altman in 2006, it’s so moving to hear his commentary on this wild, dreamy movie. I saw this film in the theaters when it was released and always loved it. I don’t care what anyone says, Robert Altman has directed more interesting roles for women than just about any director alive or dead. On his commentary, Altman reveals how all Millie’s diary entries, the menus she makes up for her “dinner parties” (which she’s “famous for”), and even her eye makeup were created by actress Shelley Duvall herself. I could never get enough of Janice Rule, and seeing her in this movie, so beautiful and soulful, I get the same ache as when I see Warren Oates on-screen . . . knowing they’re gone and I will never get that chance to work with either one of them. So Janice Rule’s performance here is all the more precious to me. Sissy Spacek is able to go from completely naturalistic to totally surreal . . . and still hold her character—it’s amazing. She was very young and novice at the time, yet she completely pulls it off brilliantly."