"Everything is wondrous about this film: the writing, the casting, the texture of the image, the framing, the rhythm of the editing, the music, the direction as a whole. The title, though, the result of a necessary deal with idiotic distributors who imposed it over the original Dear Martha . . . , is a miss. Inspired by a famous case, the film is the exact opposite of your garden-variety “true crime” potboiler. It is many things at the same time: a sublime love story (Marguerite Duras dixit); a poetic exploration of the suburban landscape (right up there with Robert Frank’s The Americans); a fierce indictment of late-fifties middle-class aspirations (the trick here being that the irredeemable heroes of this epic inspire more empathy in the viewer than their victims); a level-eyed look at the hard business of murder (no romantic choreography here, and a smack on the skull with a hammer will make you recoil in horror); and too many lessons in filmmaking to quote in these few lines. In short, this is one of the great American films of the last forty years. The astonishing (and scandalous) thing is that Leonard Kastle never went on to make another film. See the film, go to the bonus tracks and see Mr. Kastle speak: the intelligence, the humor, the clarity of the craft will leave you gasping. It is so good to hear someone who has the arrogance of his modesty."

"Sister Lovers is one of the most beautiful records. It's probably the record I've listened to more than any other. It's just a damaged and fractured, beautiful, plaintive, poetic record. And it still retains its sense of mystery. When we first went to Memphis we met Jim Dickinson [producer] and I asked him loads of questions on how he recorded Sister Lovers. We actually went to the studios where they recorded the album twice. We were absolutely obsessed by that record. Dickinson told stories about the recording process and allowing Alex Chilton to be himself. There's no one like them in the rock canon. There's a lot of pain in the record, a howl, anguish and pain. It's the sound of defeat. But there's also a duality of victory and defeat too, which is really rare in music but it makes it so appealing and attractive. Alex Chilton could go from The Box Tops to Big Star – the first two albums were pop rock, Byrds-y commercial songs. Then, he made Sister Lovers, which was like an art record. Pure art. There's nothing commercial about it. No one would release it. It was recorded in '74 to '75 and was released in 1978, after punk. This was because he was ahead of his time. It's only in the last 15 to 20 years that people have picked up on Sister Lovers. A record like no other."