It felt like a scientific discovery to a 19 year old me when I realised that each set of dancers were moving to a specific instrument layer in the song. The synaesthetic alchemy of video and music have since been inseparable for me.

Kubrick’s unsettling meditation on evil, and Wendy Carlos’s eerie, unfamiliar synth textures make this my favourite film. I love all of Kubrick’s movies. Perfect blends of story and craft, none outdoing the other. There is no other genre-hopping perfectionist like him.

Nigeriens dance and pageant around as they get “possessed” by their British colonial administrators. This controversial documentary ended by offending both colonisers and the colonised. Sometimes, the most powerful direction is none at all.

There was a scene in ‘Baraka’ where they cut from a shot of chicken in a crowded factory-line, to humans packed like sardines in a metro train. I remember deciding at that precise moment that I wanted to make films.

In a country where cinema is predominantly a business commodity, it’s so refreshing to see a left-of-centre oddity like this toss every convention out the window—and yet stay completely watchable. Nothing makes sense, and somehow, everything does.

Richard E Grant’s portrayal of a booze soaked actor is so convincing, I felt cheated when I got to know he’s a teetotaler in real life. A cult dark humor classic that gets funnier with every watch. “The best tailoring you’ve ever seen is above your f**king appendix.”

This seminal spot blurs the line between art and advertising, even 25 years later. I remember Glazer admitting he wasn’t sure the CG horses would work. When you’re trying to break new ground, there are no guarantees — only conviction.

The opening shot of the mountains with Popol Vuh’s haunting soundtrack is cinema magic. And Aguirre spiralling into madness, counterpointed by the lush but unforgiving Amazonian jungle. It reminds me of Herzog’s line from Burden of Dreams: ‘The birds don’t sing, they screech in pain.’

Old, degraded film stock distorts the original visuals, turning defects into effects and creating surreal beauty.