"I saw Blue for the first time when I was in film school. I checked out a VHS tape from the library and watched it on a twelve-inch TV/VCR. The movie finished and I sat staring at the dark screen while the tape auto-rewound. When it reached the beginning, I pressed “Play” and watched it a second time. When it stopped the second time, I turned everything off, went to bed, and stared at the ceiling. A week or so later, I finished the trilogy and thought, If these are called movies, we need a new name for everything else. I’ve never seen music sewn through film so deeply, as if the actors were thinking the soundtrack while they were acting. However he did it, Kieślowski caught the chaos of being human without the mania (for instance, the elderly woman carefully disposing of recyclables). His films are life-affirming for the jaded—they are the smartest and sexiest of unintentionally philosophical films, never talking down or forgetting to entertain. And the ending of Red—well, isn’t that the ending of everything?"

"I saw Blue for the first time when I was in film school. I checked out a VHS tape from the library and watched it on a twelve-inch TV/VCR. The movie finished and I sat staring at the dark screen while the tape auto-rewound. When it reached the beginning, I pressed “Play” and watched it a second time. When it stopped the second time, I turned everything off, went to bed, and stared at the ceiling. A week or so later, I finished the trilogy and thought, If these are called movies, we need a new name for everything else. I’ve never seen music sewn through film so deeply, as if the actors were thinking the soundtrack while they were acting. However he did it, Kieślowski caught the chaos of being human without the mania (for instance, the elderly woman carefully disposing of recyclables). His films are life-affirming for the jaded—they are the smartest and sexiest of unintentionally philosophical films, never talking down or forgetting to entertain. And the ending of Red—well, isn’t that the ending of everything?"

"His Girl Friday is funny because it’s… In that way that I think In Bruges and JCVD are just perfect, it is perfect. It is beyond perfect. It is transcendently flawless for like the first 45 minutes, and then it kind of goes off into crazy town. But you still stay with it, and the tone completely changes and it gets really weird and dark, but I guess that’s what happens in some of those movies. But it’s the perfect distillation of that kind of fast-talking, thin-line-between-love-and-hate style relationship. It would definitely be the kind of movie that, if somebody was trying to get into movies from the ’30s and ’40s and wanted that kind of patter and that kind of style, I would definitely point them in that direction. The Women is my favorite film, but it’s kind of a lot to take in, and I would understand if it scared people off a little bit. Whereas if you watch the first 20 minutes of His Girl Friday, you’re in. It’s like a starter course for that kind of film."

"""Next, I’ll go Die Hard. You have to understand, my son, who’s nine years old, is constantly asking me, “What’s your favorite movie? What’s your favorite action movie?” Every day. So, it’s hard to say to your nine-year-old, “Well, son, actually, I love watching The Magnificent Seven.” And I do, I love The Magnificent Seven. But he wants a movie that he can look forward to and see, something he can relate to, and I think, ultimately when I start talking about great action movies, you know, it’s Die Hard. Die Hard is a top five favorite film. Great villain, the right amount of humor and strength and, you know, sadism. [laughs] And Bruce Willis is fantastic. And again, the scenes with Bonnie Bedelia, you really get it. The estranged husband, conflicted home, and yet he really cares about her. It’s not just some cookie-cutter thing, like, “This is my wife; I’m doing this for you, baby!” They have major marital problems, but he’s there, and all of a sudden, he’s in the midst of it. It’s certainly the best out of the ‘80s, I think, one of the best action movies."""

"Iggy reminds me a lot of me. And it's all in that name; it's all in the title of that album. It’s raw power, you know? I like the funk that David Bowie was able to get behind Iggy. Believe it or not, I first saw an image of Iggy Pop at church, and they were talking about secret messages and backward masking - and they had [a picture of] Iggy Pop looking crazy. I didn't get into it until later, but I think how I was introduced to it was 'I Wanna Be Your Dog'. And what I like about Iggy is it's just genuine raunch. And the album seems like it’s all done in one take. 'Let's do that one, leave it, just try something else'. With his energy on stage, it seems as if the studio was just destroyed after that album - or at least you'd like to believe that. I just read an interview with him in which he said he wrote a lot of it in Hyde Park sitting under a tree wearing pyjama's too, which gave it a cool twist as well. I just love 'Search And Destroy' and 'I Need Somebody' as well."

"It's everything that I love about music. It's hip hop, trip hop, acid jazz, alternative... I don’t want to call it R n B, but there's some soul in there. Very dark and tortured sounding soul, but soul nonetheless. It's fusion, is what it is. What I liked most about rock music, besides the music I make, is when I don't understand what they're talking about. Geoff Barrow... See, I've never seen Geoff Barrow. I don't know how he looks, although he probably doesn't look like he's supposed to be making this kind of music. I heard stories about it, how they’d record certain stuff to wax and then sample it. Just going through a lot of shit to make the record. It's just so grand, and you think of the artist - who gave them the blank cheque to go to that extreme!? Someone could have easily rapped on all of that stuff. It sounds almost like Wu Tang production, something RZA did. I can hear rhyming over it, but Beth Gibbons has this pixie-kind of vocal, with that ethereal and enchanted kind of thing. It's awesome."

"Along with Airplane, An American Werewolf in London, and Raising Arizona, this film is one that I can silently mouth along with every single line of. I don’t know if Reiner, Guest, McKean, and Shearer could have ever known back in 1984 quite how far-reaching the influence of this movie would be. As a British director who made his start in TV comedy, I can vouch for the fact that this film is one of the key texts for every single UK comedy writer, actor, and director of my generation. The fact that it was performed by American actors doing killer English accents just makes that all the more impressive and ironic. So I cannot overestimate its position as an unassailable comedy classic. Along with Monty Python’s Life of Brian (also on Criterion) and Mike Leigh’s 1976 TV movie Nuts in May, it really became one of those movies that create strong bonds in creative partnerships. You either liked Spinal Tap or you were not worth talking to; it became that simple. And quite right too. It’s eighty-four minutes of comedy heaven."

"I just love the songs on this. I’m not into the whole religious aspect of the band but I’ve been a fan since I saw them on Top Of The Pops doing ‘Fire’. The reason that I picked this over Achtung Baby - which is one of my favourite U2 albums from my favourite period of U2 – is that it’s just a massive album for me. When I get time to have a quiet moment on my own, I could sit and play all the songs off this on an acoustic guitar for ages. They’re just great. You don’t like it? I don’t give a fuck! Everyone that I’ve ever known – EVER KNOWN – apart from my wife – hates them. Me and my wife love them. It wasn’t the reason we got married… But everyone else I have ever met from my earliest memory in Manchester to right now talking to you has gone, 'They are fucking shit. They are what’s wrong with music.' For me it’s about the songwriting. If I could write a song like ‘Running To Stand Still’ and ‘Nobody’s Home’ by Pink Floyd then I could die happy with never writing another song again."