Benny Safdie

“Meantime, Benny talked about Meantime. There's a scene towards the end of the movie that was wildly, that remains a wild inspiration to us at all times. And Tim Roth actually at Venice, remember when we kind of accosted him and I said to him, I said, first I said, I said Made in Britain changed my life. He said, yeah, me too. And then Benny said, no, but Meantime is really it.”

“What a feat of a suspense film in which the movie gives away its ending. It's a spoiler alert in the title, yet it still... It tells you exactly what happens and yet the whole time you're like, oh my god, is he going to get away? It's like, yes, he escaped. A Man Escaped.”

“These are two incredible queer cinema films. One of the great early performances, Daniel Day-Lewis. Stephen Frears, Stephen Frears is like one of these incredible kind of shapeshifters, the way his career kind of just ebbs and flows. And we saw this 35mm in Munich and it was a double billing with Hero.”

“And then Fox and His Friends is... Is that our favorite Fassbinder? It might be. If anything for that title, that title shot alone.”

“Bicycle Thieves, greatest movie. This is my number one movie of all time.”

“There is a sequence in Good Time that was very much inspired... Ronnie was just like, there's a sequence in Walkabout where, you know, there's a hyper-fast montage of scientists in the middle of the desert. And he was, when we wanted to do the police montage, he's like, we gotta, he showed me, he was like, we gotta do this, the way that this deals with the scientists at work.”

“Oh wait, is The Moment of Truth... Is it there? Incredible, incredible, incredible movie. This... I've never... I have very few experiences in a theater that... There was a visual, it was a visual gut punch. The very concept of treating Techniscope in a kind of verite way and just the hybrid element of Miguelin and his relationship with the bulls and his relationship with fame. This movie is so beautifully devastating. Everything about this movie has been inspiring in so many ways.”

“Blood Simple is the... The restoration is incredible on Blood Simple.”

“Wait, did you have The Player? I don't have The Player. Perfect portrait of Hollywood. But Altman, he says the way he talks about making movies is incredible. He called it... I guess I didn't know it was the name of his company, but Sandcastle Films. He said everybody gets together, all you and all your friends for that moment, you get together and you build a castle, build a sandcastle, and then you step back and you look at it and you watch the waves come and just take it away out to sea.”

“Benny, this kind of changed your life a little bit. Oh my god, Il Posto. I was going to be a physicist. I dropped out of my school and then Josh told me to come to his class and they were showing all these neorealist films and this was one of the films that they were showing that day and I remember just being like, oh my god, you can make movies like this? And it was so shocking and then I left and I went to the same school.”

“When did L'argent happen? I'm convinced this is a dark comedy because Bresson is funny in his own way. And if you think about the premise of this movie, it's about a joke gone horribly, horribly wrong and it's seen through to its very end. And it's... Yes, it's kind of crazy and dark, but the very base of it sounds like a joke. It's so insane.”

“So Benny, have you seen Tess? I have not seen Tess. When we were in Cannes, all of a sudden I looked over and like everyone in our immediate crew was just like literally some of them were on their knees praying to someone. And I was like, what is going on? And it was Nastassja Kinski.”

“Oh, Princess Bride. Gotta take that. That’s an amazing– This is one of my favorite movies of all time, and it will be useful for the movie I’m about to make. So I’m going to take the 4K UHD of that.”

“A Blu-ray of this, The War Room. This is an unbelievable documentary. Chris Hegedus, D. A. Pennebaker. Maceo and I watched this religiously to understand how they filmed everything, the way it looked, the way the camera moved, the way the extras were blocking the camera, literally everything about this movie we studied. And it’s just incredible. And I cannot wait to have a Blu-ray version of it, because it’s also shot on 16mm and it was part of the reasons why I shot Smashing Machine on 16mm.”

“When We Were Kings. This is a great one. This is another documentary that we watched, just in preparation. Such a beautiful portrait of a fighter getting ready. There’s nothing like seeing George Foreman hit the heavy bag and dent it the way that he does. Oh my God. And, oh, Kelefa, he writes the... He writes the essay. Kelefa’s the best.”

“Oh, wait, you have Carnal Knowledge? No way. Yes. Done. I love– This is an incredible movie. Every single person’s Performance is completely unique and individual, and then seeing them all combine and combust, it’s just wild. And Art Garfunkel is unbelievable in this movie. And Jack Nicholson is... There’s just something really... I can’t even believe it.”

“Flow! Oh, yes. This is... Literally, this is one of the best movies I’ve seen in such a long time. I was watching it the other day with my kids and our cat who loved the movie because the actual sounds in the movie are real animals and they can tell. So, when you’re playing it on your screen, they watch too. So it’s a truly full-family affair, and so deserving of all of the accolades and awards. I love this thing. And I can’t wait to see what it looks like in 4K UHD.”

“Husbands. Done. I’m going to take this. So, yeah, this shot, specifically, this is very inspiring, just for a lot of things that I’ve done recently. Specifically how it kind of captures the actors free in the frame, long lens, is just, like, remarkable. And the performances here are just out of control. I remember actually, the first time I saw this movie, it was in 4:3, and then when I finally saw the widescreen version, it was the scene of him on the telephone.”

“Oh, Great Escape. Done. Sorry, last one.”

“Oh, Wim Wenders, yes! Okay. This is incredible. Literally every single… I have not seen Wrong Move, so I’m excited to see that. But Kings of the Road and Alice in the Cities are two of the greatest movies ever made, and I like to think of Kings of the Road as the adult version of Alice in the Cities. Two of the greatest title shots, Alice in the Cities and Kings of the Road. The actual titles, when they come up, are unbelievable.”

“Oh, The Red Balloon, that’s… Oh, wait. Okay, what other stories? Because I’ve seen White Mane. I’ve not seen these other ones. This is an incredible, beautiful movie. It’s one of those movies as a kid that you kind of watch and you don’t even really remember if you saw it or if it was part of your own memory. And the same with White Mane. He’s just… They’re really special, so this is… I can’t wait to watch this with my kids.”