"I grew up in a rural area and with four channels on a black and white TV. Birdman of Alcatraz would come on TV, anything with Don Knotts, like The Incredible Mr. Limpet, but Wizard of Oz was a big deal. That movie came on a couple times a year and as a little kid, as all kids are, I was pretty skeeved out by the flying monkeys. But I got past that and just really, really loved the film. I think that I related to the fantastical story as a whole, and also to the idea of being in a rural area and wondering what else is out there — what’s on the other side of the rainbow, so to speak. It was formative. When I was 19, I moved to Austin, Texas, and I went to the Varsity theater — rest in peace, Varsity theater — and saw the movie as an adult. When they’re in Oz and it’s suddenly color, I gasped, because I only had a black and white TV, and in the back of my head I knew the movie turned to color, but I had forgotten. That was a really wonderful surprise. Also, seeing it on a big screen made the movie that much more of a great gift."

"That would have to be a James Bond film, and then I was trying to think of what my favorite one would be. And I guess it would probably be You Only Live Twice. Mr. Connery. Even though I really like Roger Moore, too. I mean I liked all the Bonds, honestly. Including the newest, Mr. Craig. He’s fantastic. But yeah, You Only Live Twice. It takes place in Japan as a part of it, and you’ve got Blofeld, Spectre, the classic villains, and the whole thing with the volcano that’s really a secret lair. And you’ve got Russia and the United States. You know, it’s huge in scope. And I don’t know, it’s this great classic Bond to me, and a great song, a great theme song. I think the first time I saw it, I definitely saw it on TV. I’m not sure what year it came out, but I may not have even been born yet when that came out. I mean my first exposure to James Bond was absolutely on television. And then my first one to see in the theater, which I also love, is The Spy Who Loved Me. That was pretty exciting. That was the first Bond I saw at a movie theater."

"The title of the film refers to “the gods”—in French, le paradis—that upper gallery in a theater where the seats are cheap and the audience boisterous. Throughout the film, we are the audience watching parallel stories in which the world of the stage, presented largely in mime, mirrors the “real-life” setting, itself of course a fiction shown on the screen. Through the obvious theatricality of the stage and the far subtler theatricality of the “real” story, we follow a tale of love, loss, and revenge straight from late nineteenth-century French literature but reinvigorated by the magic of film."

"I saw this movie for the first time at the Elgin Theater on Eighth Avenue as part of a double feature with The Tenant a long time ago, when I was young and scared. I didn’t like it. But I was young and scared. Eighth Avenue used to be scary. I honestly don’t remember why I didn’t like it, but just a few years later I would be mocking my younger, uninformed self. I absolutely love everything about this movie, from its cheesiness (camera as murder weapon) to its sheer profundity (camera as murder weapon). Anna Massey should be a household name."