"Let’s tall about Kurosawa‘s Dreams. When Bravo first came on television, they were figuring out who they were as a cable network and would just play random foreign films. This was before the travesty of reality television permeated their station. I was at home alone in high school, I think I was a junior in high school and Dreams comes on by Kurosawa. I could not separate myself from it. I didn’t know who Kurosawa was — I didn’t care. I was just a kid absorbing things that flashed on the screen in front of him. I was immediately captivated by this thing that was at once beautiful — obviously surreal — but at the same time palpable enough to actually hit home emotionally. I think not many people would probably describe scenes in my movies as surreal, but there are some. Kind of this magical realism that exists in that film. Also it feels ancient; it feels like when this boy comes home having witnessed the wedding of foxes and his mother’s there and says he can’t enter the home because he spied on the foxes and then presents a dagger to him and says, “They want you to kill yourself. Run. Run and ask for forgiveness.” It feels like an ancient story, it feels like something — I’m not sure what. It feels like something that kind of bubbled up from our beginning. I was fascinated by that. Just go watch it. It’s all skits, it’s basically short films strewn together. Get’s real weird by the end, but the first three are three of the greatest films I’ve ever seen."

"This is another film my grandfather showed me at a very young age. It was one of the first times I ever saw reality unfold like that on-screen. The more I watch it, the more that different things pop out. When I was young, this was the first time I ever saw an interaction between an African American and a young Italian kid—and that was big for me, because when I was in Italy my mother was always the only African American around and I was this young Italian kid. So seeing both these cultures represented, and seeing the way they’re represented, made me realize cinema could reflect life—that it’s not just about entertainment, that it can be about something very real. When you really think about the postwar years, the image of Italy was very much constructed through Rossellini films. In the era of Fascism, people like Rossellini and the partisan movement were silenced, so it’s not that they didn’t exist—it’s just that they weren’t allowed to be as vocal because their lives were at stake. The fact that he gave a voice to this movement, showing that Italy did in fact have this fiercely anti-Fascist side that suffered as much as anyone, I think was very important for how Italy has been seen in the postwar years. It’s one of those rare moments when a director has this deeply personal film to make that also coincides with one of the biggest events in world history. I’m definitely drawn to this tradition of filmmaking because I grew up on these films as much as I grew up on Disney."

"You know, it’s tough to really summate your favorite movies, and it changes so often based on your vibe and things like that. When I w­as thinking about it, I was trying to think of what are the movies that continually show up in the top 10. And I landed on The Bicycle Thief – or Bicycle Thieves; sometimes people say “thief,” sometimes say “thieves.” [Director Vittorio] De Sica’s Bicycle Thief is like a north star project for me. First of all, it’s arguably the greatest film in the father-son series. It’s one of the bits of neo-realist masterpiece. The way that De Sica aligned it with his casting and the themes of his movie is always an inspiration. The fact that he saw Lamberto Maggiorani at the audition, that he showed up with his son – he’s a factory worker who showed up with his son – he immediately said, “Oh, this is the guy who needs to play the character.” And the fact that he cast the kid, Enzo, off of the street while they were filming, who was selling flowers for his father. The fact that De Sica had the vision to try to blur the lines, starting with casting and then, towards the climax of the movie he shot, he modeled his production around the release of a soccer match. So that he knew he was going to have hundreds upon thousands, thousands upon thousands of people leaving the stadium at the same time. And he would shoot around. He’s using reality as the fabric of his fiction film. And that, to me, makes it an ultimate masterpiece of all time."

"What a surprise! Actually a movie about people! No special effects, no super heroes, no gunfights; just a riveting two hours and 15 minutes about some human beings you can recognize as real, going through the agonizing upheavals of a marriage that is no longer working, and therefore facing the daunting, heartbreaking throes of divorce. That’s Noah Baumbach’s new picture, “Marriage Story,” and it is right up there with the best of this exceptional director-writer’s finest work, thus only confirming my long-held opinion that Baumbach is vividly among the top picture-makers of his generation. It is a joy to see and hear actors speaking dialogue that is superbly crafted and profoundly believable. And to watch a film during which the camera is always in the right place for the actors to shine and the scenes to play most effectively for the audience. All this talented and insightful direction, of course, results in brilliant performances. If there is a more nakedly affecting and moving turn by an actor than Adam Driver’s here, I certainly haven’t seen it. He’s always good, but this is truly striking, vividly touching, and simply as good as it gets in modern pictures. I always enjoy Scarlett Johansson’s work, and she certainly doesn’t disappoint here. And Alan Alda’s aging character is memorably drawn. Like so much of the best American movies, Baumbach’s work here is both deeply personal (though not autobiographical) and at the same time quite clearly universal. I really hope that this picture is successful enough to encourage other filmmakers to bring real people to the screen, and to tell stories that resonate with reality."