"In the mid-seventies I got more into the art of cinema (and into the arts in general), which coincided with a great period in American cinema. I got seriously hooked on Taxi Driver, Badlands, Days of Heaven. These films with alienated heroes, where landscape becomes soul-scape. They made me realize that cinema can be this amazing space where images, words, faces, landscapes, and music all melt together in a mysterious way. Even now, my favorite films are those that take you out of yourself, that make you enter this other world on-screen. These three films did exactly that to me."

"A coming-of-age story of two young Catholic girls in Ireland. This is a writer who is a woman, a lover, a daughter, a mother and she tries to bring all that together in her work. So few women writers were doing that in the 1960s. Instead, they were writing through a male persona, because they knew that otherwise they wouldn't be taken seriously. But as O'Brien says, 'I am the mother of sons; my sons have given me joy. I am a lover of men, and men have broken my heart -- but they've also given me joy."

"I don’t know how controversial it is in Beach Boys fan circles but I really like the Brother years. It’s as if they’ve all spent years with a genius, learning how to do it, soaking up musical know-how like sponges and then just gone for it themselves. There are some great songs – The Trader is one of my favourites, and Sail On Sailor is one of my wife’s all-time favourite songs. I’m drawn to beauty in music. You can put three chords together and it does something weird to me. It feels a little bit like magic."

"Godfather one and two, as one movie — but not blended together; I don’t think that worked when they tried to combine them [for the TV version]. I have to just say that The Godfather is a quintessential American film, where it’s absolutely satisfying. The writing is so excellent — what is being said, and the nuance of what is being said, is so understood. And the color, again, situates you in a particular moment in time. It’s a portrait of America. It’s one of those things where storytelling and acting found one of those magical, elegant solutions…"

"I was about 14, 15 when I first heard this. There was a period just before punk when I was at grammar school. Grammar school being grammar school they tended to like these white rock bands. That was where I got introduced to bands like Yes, Zeppelin, Tangerine Dream, that I also liked. For me, they are my favourite American rock band. Their synergy, the way they play together, and again the engineering of that album, I don't think was ever surpassed. It's got everything. I suppose the Beach Boys might be contenders, but the Doors are my favourites."