"I think because this film is so much fun and the food in it is so great, it’s easy to miss how brilliant the actual filmmaking is. The more I watch it, the more amazed I am by Itami’s craft and how he created such a hugely varied, multifaceted set of stories that add up to a beautifully cohesive and fluid film that is so incredibly funny, warmhearted, and wise."

"I’m a big fan of animation. I was just talking to my manager about how amazing How to Train Your Dragon is. The animation is out of this world, and the story… And I love that animated films now have evolved so much that they’re real heart-wrenching stories. It’s not just for kids, but adults enjoy them now as well. It’s just such a beautifully done film."

"Version Control is perhaps the strangest fictional work of appropriated voices and subjects. It’s set in a surreal near future — or several near futures — as well as in several pasts. Though issues of race play virtually no role in the stories, one character, an African-American physicist, recalls dropping out of a writing course because the professor thought he should be mining his heritage instead of inventing science fiction."

"This is my favorite collection of short stories, and every time I pick it up, it reminds me that there is a genius on Earth with heart and humor so evolved I have to wonder if she is from the future. This book breaks my brain open so it can grow. I'll be sitting there on my island, praying that someone will drop Barrodale's next book on my head from heaven."

"The short stories of Flannery O’Connor landed hard on me. You could feel within them the unknowability of God, the intangible mysteries of life that confounded her characters, and which I find by my side every day. They contained the dark Gothicness of my childhood and yet made me feel fortunate to sit at the center of this swirling black puzzle, stars reeling overhead, the earth barely beneath us."

"This movie (like, Badlands a movie that’s not on this particular list) is almost perfect. Not a wasted shot, piece of dialogue, moment, or frame. John Sayles has made some amazing movies but this is my favorite of his. A beautiful, forceful movie that tells a dozen different stories wrapped around one specific, true pivotal moment in American history. And every single actor is perfect and perfectly cast."