"All right, Stanley Kubrick was a genius, the master of the big, ambitious film that stuns the senses, like 2001: A Space Odyssey. But Paths of Glory is one of the last great triumphs of black-and-white filmmaking. It is also a tribute to the talent of Kirk Douglas, who here takes on the role of a French colonel in the trenches of the First World War with such explosive energy that one realizes how many films (and directors) were unworthy of Kirk’s genius as an actor—his first acting role, by the way, was onstage as the servant in Chekhov’s The Three Sisters, with Catherine Cornell, Judith Anderson, and my mother as the sisters and Ruth Gordon as the dreadful sister-in-law. Nobody has ever captured the First World War better on film (except perhaps for Jean Renoir in Grand Illusion, which is in a class by itself). A heartbreaking giant of a film, not a bad shot or a wasted frame in it; perfect filmmaking."

"Oh, oh, Night of the Hunter. That’s just a film that… It was actually recommended to me by Fran Walsh, Peter Jackson’s wife. I think it’s her favorite film of all time. I’d never really seen anything like it because it’s kind of a film noir set in the South. The story, it’s about a family who are terrorized by a con-man. Robert Mitchum was an incredible actor — the original Cape Fear is another incredible performance by him — but it’s such a slimy performance in this film. He’s such a great manipulator and tells tall tales. And it’s famous because he’s got these tattoos on his knuckles of “love” and “hate” and it actually is a conduit for a really great story that he repeats throughout the film. The cinematography’s incredible; it’s just like all blacks and whites and hard shadows and lots of silhouettes along the river. It’s just a stunning, a stunning film! It’s really good. Talking about these movies makes me want to see these movies again. [laughing] They’re so good!"

"I think it’s one of the funniest movies ever made. I think Charles Grodin is hugely underrated as a comedic actor. I think he’s brilliant. Jeannie Berlin who recently got a lot of attention again because of Kenneth Lonergan’s movie Margaret is amazing in this movie — she was actually nominated for an Oscar for it. Cybill Shepherd is great. I just love it, I love how what a s— the central character is, he’s really totally selfish and also really confused, in a great way. I also love that a lot of the comedy typically in movies like this, with sort of high concept plots, the comedy and the drama are driven by the central character lying to the people around them. But weirdly in The Heartbreak Kid, most of the drama comes from him telling the truth, he’s sort of excessively honest and straight forward, and it still manages to complicate these situations and cause a lot of tension and hurt feelings, but I just love Elaine May, I like all of her movies."

"The first Rocky. Just an amazing movie. Whatever the hunger is, the fight, literally and figuratively, that Sylvester Stallone had in him to make the movie, right? To go through people saying, “Nah, nah.” And even Carl Weathers said, at one point, “Okay, this is incredible. So who’ll play Rocky?” And they’re like, “Sylvester Stallone, this young kid nobody knows.” And just him selling the dog, getting the dog back, the whole story behind it — during pre-production he buys the dog back. And Talia Shire was amazing, Francis Ford Coppola’s sister. It was just Sly Stallone at his very best, even as a writer-producer. And the incredible actor who played Mickey, Burgess Meredith. It’s an amazing movie you can watch over and over, no matter the gender or color or creed or religion. Rocky is a survivor’s movie, an American tale of a young kid trying to make good, and he finally makes good. It’s just such a great movie. The wardrobing, the score, the music, it’s unbelievable."