Richard Gadd

“I've got to go here to Happiness by Todd Solondz. I remember first seeing this when I was at university and it kind of blew my mind. It's very hard to sum up the plot of this. A bunch of misfits kind of shuffling their way through life in really sort of kind of very dark and very idiosyncratic ways. Some of the storylines and plotlines I couldn't believe. It was very much a sort of artistic coming-of-age film for me in the sense that I didn't quite realize that film could go to these depths.”

“Memories of Murder, Bong Joon-ho. Parasite's a ten out of ten for me but this somehow was a ten point one out of ten. It was just incredible. When I describe the plot, it's a detective trying to solve the crime of a serial killer and a lot of people feel like that's a plot they've seen before, but the way he does it, the frustration you feel emanating out of the camera. It's got huge satire at the heart of it, corruption in the police force, the damage that incompetence does to victims.”

“Trainspotting. Probably my most favorite film of all time. I remember when I sat down to do Baby Reindeer I really wanted to have voiceover in it and so I almost watched every film that had voiceover of prominence and Trainspotting just gave it this exhilaration, this kind of pushing forward in time. It all feels like an adrenaline rush. It all feels like you're on drugs when you're watching it. It captures the euphoria in amongst the degradation. Danny Boyle just keeps that sense of play alive.”

“I can't not go to a Scorsese film and I'll go to Raging Bull. I don't think this is too controversial but I think De Niro as Jake LaMotta is the best on-screen Performance of all time. And of course you can't forget Joe Pesci in this film as well. All the acting is top notch. You realize you're kind of, and that's the beauty of acting when you actually get lost and you think you're watching Real Life. There's the scene where he's punching the wall and you feel everything in your own hands.”

“I've got to bring out another Scorsese one, The Last Waltz. The thing that I love most is it does have talking heads and it does have all the band sort of speaking about why they've decided to call it a day, but really he just lets the music play. And that's the thing with Scorsese, I never ever feel like he gets in the way of the story he's about to tell. I feel everything he does as a director, which is why he's the greatest, is that he pulls the story out and honors it in the correct way.”

“Oh is this Gimme Shelter? Is this that Rolling Stones one? Yeah. Oh my god, this is another amazing music documentary. I've realized doing this that I'm a sucker for a music documentary actually. And I think it's often spoken about as being like the end of the 60s and peace and love and all this stuff, this kind of horrific act kind of happening at the very heart of one of the gigs of one of the bands that kind of made the 60s what it was. It's an absolute must watch.”

“Easy Rider. I've seen this film so many times. Jack Nicholson, he comes in kind of close to the end and I always remember the tragedy of the Performance. I always remember him every time he takes a drink he goes [makes noise]. So that's always stayed with me. It's very interesting you see tripping on TV a lot but you never see it as realistically well done as this where you feel like the characters are actually going through quite a lot of personal anguish and pain. It's a timeless piece.”