Always fascinated by performance, Ethan was ensorcelled by Marcel Carné's 1945 theatrical spectacle. "CHILDREN OF PARADISE is a big-budget movie that is made for adults," he says. "I just wish we got to see more of that."
"If you're an actor, your dream is to intersect with the great filmmaker and the opportunity to give a great performance," says Ethan. Terrence Malick's poetic crime noir, starring Sissy Spacek and Martin Sheen, hits the bullseye.
REDS, is a masterpiece that Ethan doesn't want people to forget. The acting, photography, music and writing-"it's like each appendage is doing its job to the point where you can't tell where one begins and one ends," he says.
While acknowledging that the younger generation can find black-and-white movies to be a slog, Ethan believes that THE LAST PICTURE SHOW-"so poetic, so funny, so unpretentious"-is an excellent starting point.
The indelible one-liners (which he committed to memory) of Alex Cox's REPO MAN taught a young Ethan that this film didn't play by the usual rules: "There aren't many punk rock movies, and that is a punk rock movie."
After feeling self-conscious during a conversation with directors and film buffs Quentin Tarantino and Richard Linklater, Ethan sought out a VHS tape of TWO-LANE BLACKTOP to see what the hype was about.
"I was madly in love for the first time in my life when I saw that movie," recalls Ethan of Jane Campion's AN ANGEL AT MY TABLE. With its revelatory female gaze, the film sent him and his beloved hightailing to find Janet Frame's poetry.
"One of my friends said that a really great film starts as the end credits roll, because it rings a bell and it vibrates with you, and then it begins as you walk away from it." For Ethan, Milos Forman's classic continues to reverberate.
Ethan's love of music began at a very young age, when his piano-playing father introduced him to the basics of melody and chord progression. "Music is instantaneous. Music breaks down so many of society's walls, and it's just so powerful."
"I think I've somehow internalized Bob Fosse in some strange way," says Ethan, describing how the director's obsession with performance informed his own filmmaking.
The first movie Ethan ever saw was Bob Rafelson's 1970 drama FIVE EASY PIECES, and its complex, emotionally honest characterizations have stuck with him ever since.
Ethan admires the deference to mysticism and respect for the natural order in Peter Weir's films, calling Linda Hunt's turn as Tommy Kwan "one of the all-time great performances." The actor studied this film before working with Weir.
