Quentin Tarantino listed his Top 10 movies of the 21st Century, and the list had quite a few surprises.
In an interview on the Bret Easton Ellis podcast, he named Woody Allen's Midnight In Paris as the film at 10th spot.
This is a must read list, after all Tarantino's own movies like Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs and Kill Bill are rated among the best.
10. Midnight In Paris
Director: Woody Allen
'I really can't stand Owen Wilson,' Tarantino said on the podcast.
'I spent the first time watching the movie loving it and hating him. The second time I watched it, I was like "Ah, okay, don't be such a p***k, he's not so bad." Then, the third time I watched it, I found myself only watching him.'
9. Shaun Of The Dead
Director: Edgar Wright
'The script is really terrific, it's one of the most quotable films on this list. I still quote the line "The dogs don't look up".'
'It's not a spoof of zombie movies, it's a real zombie movie, and I appreciate the distinction,' Tarantino said.
8. Mad Max: Fury Road
Director: George Miller
Tarantino once said that he 'rejected' the film when he first saw it because 'in a world of Mel Gibson, how is he not playing Max?'
But he watched it again thrice over a weekend because it thought it was 'so terrific.'
7. Unstoppable
Director: Tony Scott
'It's one of my favourite last movies of a director. I've seen it four times, and every time I see it, I like it more. If you had asked me years ago, I would have put Man on Fire on the list, but Unstoppable is one of the purest visions of Tony's action aesthetic,' Tarantino said.
6. Zodiac
Director: David Fincher
'When I first watched Zodiac, I wasn't that into it, and then it started playing the movie channels, and first thing I knew, watching 20 minutes of it, 40 minutes of it, and I realised this is a lot more engaging than I remember it being, and it kept grabbing me in different sections, so I decided to watch this goddamn thing again. It was a whole different experience from that point on,' he said.
5. There Will Be Blood
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
'There Will Be Blood would stand a good chance at being Number 1 or 2 if it didn't have a big, giant flaw in it... and the flaw is Paul Dano,' he said.
'Dano is weak sauce, man. He is the weak sister. Austin Butler would have been wonderful in that role. He's just such a weak, weak, uninteresting guy.'
4. Dunkirk
Director: Christopher Nolan
'The first time, it's not like it left me cold -- it was so kind of gobsmacking, I didn’t really know what I saw, it was almost too much, and then the second time I saw it, my brain was able to take it in a little bit more, and then the third time and the fourth time, it was just like, wow, it just blew me away,' he said.
3. Lost In Translation
Director: Sofia Coppola
'I fell so much in love with Lost in Translation that I fell in love with Sofia Coppola and made her my girlfriend,' Tarantino said with a laugh.
2. Toy Story 3
Director: Lee Unkrich
'That last five minutes ripped my f****** heart out, and if I even try to describe the end, I'll start crying and get choked up.
'It's almost a perfect movie... the greatest end of a trilogy.'
1. Black Hawk Down
Director: Ridley Scott
'I think it's a masterwork, and one of the things I love so much about it is this is the only movie that actually goes completely for an Apocalypse Now sense of purpose and visual effect and feeling, and I think it achieves it. It keeps up the intensity for two hours 45 minutes, or whatever it is.'
Photographs curated by Satish Bodas/Rediff