"Requiem for a Dream is a really interesting film. It changed my idea of what people really wanted to see. Because I came from the UK, as a European film director, it was interesting to see how American studios or financiers were really into European cinema. They would always quote certain movies that I made that nobody else had seen — like Gangster No. 1. I was amazed, like, ‘Wow, you’ve actually seen that movie?’ And it dawned on me that people in America aren’t that dumb after all, you know? They’re kind of smart — much smarter than I was about movies. And when I saw Requiem for a Dream, I understood it. This guy got cash, he got money, to make this movie. It’s quite a hard movie to actually sell — can you imagine trying to sell that movie? And for that alone I think Aronofsky is a genius. I like what he does. I even liked The Fountain. The Wrestler is a great movie; I think Pi is a genius piece of work. I think he deserves a lot of praise. For people like me, who come from Europe and go to America and think nobody’s going to know what I’ve done, I’m a struggling filmmaker, and then suddenly you go into a studio and the head exec is like, ‘Gangster No. 1, I loved that film, it had this and that person in it…’ They see everything. I was quite cheered by that."

"Many of the bands on this list are British. I was heavily influenced by British bands. At that particular time [Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, etc. were releasing music] there was just an overwhelming amount of great music from across the Pond, from The Beatles forward. There was so much quantity and quality. All of these bands, in one way or another, either spurted out each other or inspired each other or created a split for somebody to go a different way. That sort of environment, using my own experience, with what happened in our small town with a handful of bands, it was a healthy level of respect and competition at the same time that kind of spurred the growth of all our bands. I'd assume it would be the same for a lot of these UK bands. To all metalheads, British Steel is one of the flagship records of all times. I dunno how many times I've been hanging with Dimebag [Darrell] and Vinnie Paul [from Pantera and Damageplan] and be cranking that record. You know, Dime always had a razor blade [pendant] around his neck and that's because of this record. These are some of the first riffs I started really learning how to play. K.K. Downing and Glenn Tipton are one of the all-time great dual guitars in metal, for sure, and Rob Halford is just the best. There's nobody like him."