"So here’s where, for me, it comes down to either the second Godfather, Taxi Driver, which is [Martin] Scorsese’s best film, I think, or one of two or three Altmans, I guess. And of those three, I’d probably go with Taxi Driver. It’s pretty great, and it’s one of the most dangerous films ever to come out of this country, I think. And it’s got great performances, and it’s got such electric ambiguity in what it’s saying about this guy. For me, that film marks, probably, the end point of that great period of the 1970s. So many fine directors; Altman, Coppola, the freedom of expression. I almost didn’t have the resources to deal with Taxi Driver when I first saw it . I don’t go back to it all the time, because it’s such a handful, but I think that’s Scorsese’s best film."

"When I was twenty-one and first coming around to the idea of directing movies, I found a purse on the floor of the NYU library late one night. There was a hundred bucks in there along with IDs and credit cards. I pocketed the cash but left the rest alone and handed it to the security guard. I used this money to purchase three movies at Mondo Kim’s. For some irrational reason, I confessed this theft to my parents. They demanded to know what was going through my head. I couldn’t explain the action, but I knew that I needed to use that money to purchase necessary evils. Stolen money, stolen ideas. I bought three films that I would take a lot from in the years to come: Ali, Pasolini’s Oedipus Rex (not on Criterion yet . . .), and Pickpocket."

"When I was twenty-one and first coming around to the idea of directing movies, I found a purse on the floor of the NYU library late one night. There was a hundred bucks in there along with IDs and credit cards. I pocketed the cash but left the rest alone and handed it to the security guard. I used this money to purchase three movies at Mondo Kim’s. For some irrational reason, I confessed this theft to my parents. They demanded to know what was going through my head. I couldn’t explain the action, but I knew that I needed to use that money to purchase necessary evils. Stolen money, stolen ideas. I bought three films that I would take a lot from in the years to come: Ali, Pasolini’s Oedipus Rex (not on Criterion yet . . .), and Pickpocket."