"I’ll just start with the Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu. That’s one of my top fives, primarily because I love the Dracula story, of course. And I’m a huge fan of the 1922 [F.W.] Murnau film and I love that Herzog took the time to go to the actual locations where the original was shot. It’s just so simple and it is such a slow, deliberate mood throughout the film that borders on taking too much time — to the point where it’s almost a meditative state as a viewer that you get into. And that’s not even counting Klaus Kinski‘s portrayal of the vampire which, to me, rivals the [Max] Schreck 1922 portrayal. But I’m such a Kinski fan, and knowing — having insight as to how out of his mind he was in real life — portraying the vampire really lends a lot of layers to viewing it. It’s one of those few cases in which knowing the actor that portrays the role actually creates more depth in the role itself. Where normally you would want to avoid that kind of influence, in this case it really works. Because Klaus Kinski’s so unpredictable as a human being. I would imagine, based on what I’ve heard, much like Max Schreck was in 1922, it’s really a lot of interesting parallel there. For a color adaptation, it’s almost camp, in a way, but… it hasn’t crossed that line — but it almost is. I think the portrayal of Jonathan, and frankly, the girl in it [Isabelle Adjani as Lucy Harker] is probably one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen in my life. If you haven’t seen it in a while, revisit it… she’s just insane."

"Here’s another one: Seven Samurai. The great Akira Kurosawa. He’s my favorite director and a lot of his films featured my favorite actor Toshiro Mifune. I never understood a single word he said, but the force and physicality of Mifune [was] just like a damn hurricane on a screen. In Seven Samurai, this epic film, there was a scene where Mifune’s character — he’s drunk — gets hit in the head. Someone whacks him with a stick and her just comes roaring into this scene like, “Who hit me?!” And he’s hilarious and crazy and you find out by doing some homework that guy never took any acting; he just walked into an audition and said, “You need an actor? I’ll act.” He was just this raw, crazily talented guy. I became fascinated by Kurosawa many years ago on a lot of levels — the way he would light scenes, the way he would shoot things, and the fact that he would use many of his actors over and over again. Obviously, Mifune repeats all throughout Kurosawa’s career, and also Takashi Shimura is in this film, and he stars in a beautiful Kurosawa film called Ikiru, which means “To Live.” It’s one of Kurosawa’s more melancholy introspective works. It’s just a beautiful film. Every time I’ve watched it it always moves me. And in Seven Samurai, there’s so much kinda cop-buddy film — you’re like, “Wow, that’s where they’re gonna get Lethal Weapon, Fistful of Dollars, Hang Em High.” I mean they’re just gonna get so many big movies from Kurosawa. There’s a guy named Seiji Miyaguchi who’s the master swordsman in Seven Samurai, where he goes out on a mission just on his own and comes back holding some dead guy’s gun. A man with a sword takes out a guy with a gun. He just takes the gun, throws it on the ground, and I think he says, “Got two.” He just sits down and goes to sleep. This guy puts his face on his knees and goes to sleep like, “Been a rough night. Killed two guys. Oh, and here’s this gun thing. I don’t know how it works.” There are so many killer moments in Seven Samurai. Meanwhile it’s this sweeping epic [of] good versus evil. And the kind of neutral victory at the end where four of the seven samurai are dead; the farmers are just notably ungrateful for having had their assess saved by these seven selfless samurai. They’re basically rōnin — they are masterless samurai. And they go right back to their crops like, “Thanks, dude.” Really? You barely noticed what sacrifices were made, and you’re all cowards in the face of aggression. And these guys gave you everything and died doing it. There’s a lot of your own life that you could read into that. And I think Kurosawa did that magically from film to film, where he’d tap into human feelings quite often. [Kurosawa] was just a master movie maker. Master writer. Master cameraman. The dude knew how to make a movie. And Seven Samurai is just a great example of it. It’s not my favorite Kurosawa film. I just think it’s such an amazing piece of work. It’s one of my favorite films just because it’s a massive undertaking. And in my top five I did not put in a Werner Herzog film, which I’m rethinking. I probably would have put in either Fitzcarraldo or Aguirre, the Wrath of God. And so, Herzog gets an honorable mention. But moving on."