"There was a movie called Animal Factory; it was [written] by Eddie Bunker, and it was directed by Steve Buscemi. It’s probably the best prison movie that’s ever been made. It’s unbelievable. I actually helped produce that. Eddie had the script, was running around with it for a while, and then gave it to me and said, “See what you can do with it.” I remember handing it to Steve Buscemi on Con Air, and I said, “Here, Steve. Read this or I’ll kill you.” [laughs] And he read it. He loved it, but he said, “Danny, there’s nothing really in it for me,” and I said, “No, no, no, we want you to direct it.” So he got Willem Dafoe, and when he got Willem Dafoe, everybody else kind of jumped on it."

"I could go with Shadow of a Doubt, any number of Woody Allen movies, Paul Thomas Anderson, Wes Anderson — The Royal Tenenbaums I love — but I’m going to go with The Big Lebowski because it’s such a fully realized, beautiful film. John Goodman is amazing, [John] Turturro, [Steve] Buscemi, Sam Elliot — and then Jeff Bridges was fantastic. Julianne Moore. Just really, really, really, really such a satisfying film to watch, and so quotable, and something that I could have on a loop 24 hours a day in my home and never be bored with. Fantastic film. I’ll say no more."

"The Big Lebowski. Jeff Bridges – I almost put Starman down, too, but I really think I kind of don’t remember the movie so much because I haven’t seen it in so many years – but I love Jeff Bridges, and I love the movie he just did. What was it called? Crazy Heart, he’s great in that. But, I mean, there’s something about The Big Lebowski and that combination with the Coen brothers sensibility, which, he nailed that down. I don’t know exactly what you’d even call that, but brilliant. I loved his performance in that, and I loved John Goodman, and I loved Steve Buscemi. And you know who else was great in that, was Philip Seymour Hoffman. He was really good in that movie, too. Yeah, great, great, great fan of that movie."