"I had the legendary film critic Andrew Sarris as a professor during his later years. At the time, he’d gab about the auteur theory (it was his theory, you know?) and talk about Hitchcock, Wilder, and Ford. But when pressed by his sycophantic students (myself included), he’d actually declare a 1955 Max Ophuls movie “the greatest movie ever made.” It was the first time I had ever heard of Lola Montès, so I immediately blind-bought the Criterion laser disc. I eventually graduated to the Blu-ray, which I’ve now seen countless times. Lola Montès is a beautiful, virtuoso piece of cinema. It’s an old-fashioned woman’s picture. It’s a study of loneliness. It’s structurally daring and technically masterful. It’s also really fun. It’ll make you want to devour every Ophuls movie you can get your hands on. The Criterion disc also features a really lovely documentary on Ophuls, made by his filmmaker son Marcel (I find this extra touching as my father is a filmmaker too.) After watching Lola Montès, New Yorkers can check out the grave of the real-life Lola Montès in Green-Wood Cemetery, an unlikely burial place for this nineteenth-century globetrotter."

"Fight Club came into my life when I was an angsty teenager who wanted to burn down the entire world, much like the movie, and I was just like, “Yeah, you f—ing get ’em.” It just so perfectly captured every bit of teenage or young adult angst that I felt. It also is so funny. Like, I watch that movie and I just howl with laughter, it’s just so sardonic and funny, and also weirdly romantic. It’s a wonderful love story, too. I mean, obviously it’s a love story between two very dysfunctional people, but who’s not dysfunctional in their own ways? I think the writing is brilliant, I think that the cinematography is incredible, I think that David Fincher absolutely knocked that one out of the park. It’s a movie that I can watch over and over, and every time I catch a new line, or I catch a new shot, and I’m like, “Oh, wow. I never noticed that’s how they did that before, and that’s such a brilliant way to do that.” Yeah, I just think that it perfectly captures every single feeling of frustration and rage that anyone might be feeling at any moment."

"There’s always an Altman movie on the list. Currently I think it’s probably McCabe and Mrs. Miller. I love westerns; there are actually a lot of westerns I could add. A sort of deconstructed western. Altman’s one of my favorite directors and someone even whose lesser work I find really fascinating and had an intelligence about filmmaking and also about human behavior that’s kind of unmatched."

"There’s a movie called Bowfinger written by Steve Martin that I’ve watched in quarantine and it’s definitely taken me away from all this scariness in the world. It’s so hilarious, and Eddie Murphy is so genius. That’s the one that I come back to. I’ve (also) watched This is the End a bunch of times — maybe four times, something like that — because it’s hilarious."