If “Swiss Army Man” was the film that established Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (AKA The Daniels) as two interesting voices to watch, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” was the movie that catapulted them into the stratosphere. Their genre-bending multiverse saga was one of the unlikeliest awards juggernauts ever, sweeping the Oscars nearly a year after the film’s SXSW premiere.
After writing and directing two feature films as a duo, The Daniels’ creative aesthetic is fairly well-defined. The two filmmakers love using unapologetically weird premises to tell wholesome stories, and pull from a variety of influences including classic comedies, kung fu movies, and 2010s Internet culture. All of their work contains layers upon layers of explicit and implicit references to movies and TV shows that came before them. Simply put, you don’t make movies like “Everything Everywhere All at Once” without being obsessed with pop culture. And Daniel Scheinert’s favorite movies list is exactly as eclectic as you’d expect it would be.
Scheinert has been especially vocal about the movies that shaped him, and he contributed his own ballot to the 2022 Sight & Sound Best Films of All Time poll, offered some predictably outside-the-box- picks. His list is a great starting point for those looking for a skeleton key to unlock “Everything Everywhere All at Once” — or anyone who just wants to consume some delightfully wacky cinema.
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“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”
Image Credit: ©Focus Films/Courtesy Everett Collection While the Sight & Sound poll doesn’t allow voters to rank their films in order of preference, Scheinert made it very clear that Michel Gondry’s genre-bending story about the relationships we’d rather forget is his favorite film. “My undisputed champion,” Scheinert wrote in the comments section of his ballot. “Shout out to Charlie Kaufman of course.”
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“Princess Mononoke”
Image Credit: Studio Ghibli Scheinert also listed Hayao Miyazaki’s conservationist epic “Princess Mononoke” as one of his 10 favorite films for Sight & Sound. His comments were less focused on the film’s artistry than the emotional impact it had on him at a young age. “I was inspired to sew my own cosplay costume in middle school,” he wrote.
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“Wet Hot American Summer”
Image Credit: ©USA Films/Courtesy Everett Collection It’s hardly surprising that one of the minds behind “Swiss Army Man” and “Everything Everywhere All at Once” would be a fan of David Wain and Michael Showalter’s joke-a-minute comedy classic. Scheinert included “Wet Hot American Summer” on his Sight & Sound ballot, but didn’t offer any of his own words about the film. Instead, he let the script speak for itself and quoted one of the most poetic lines ever uttered about a can of vegetables:
“At a time when I was trying to hide myself from myself he was there to show me… a new way” —Gene
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“American Movie”
Image Credit: Sony Pictures Classics The Daniels grew up in an era where the Internet allowed anyone to quickly become a film connoisseur, and they’ve made no secret of the fact that their artistic worldview has been shaped by their passionate fandom. So it makes sense that Scheinert was moved by “American Movie,” Chris Smith’s beloved 1999 documentary about aspiring filmmakers with more passion than talent. Scheinert included the film on his Sight & Sound ballot and described it as: “A hilarious, heartbreaking character study of film obsessives like you and me.”
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“Tampopo”
Image Credit: Courtesy Everett Collection In another unsurprising move, Scheinert included Juzo Itami’s unclassifiable “ramen western” on his Sight & Sound list. While the whimsical pastiche of genres makes it seem like an obvious influence on “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” Scheinert focused his comments on all of the film’s decadent food porn. “Every unforgettable scene of this film has food,” Scheinert wrote. “And I love food almost as much as I love a great film.”
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“Drunken Master II”
Image Credit: Golden Harvest Anyone who has seen “Everything Everywhere All at Once” can attest to the passion for martial arts movies that Kwan and Scheinert share. In particular, both men have been open about the influence that the action movies made in Hong Kong have had on them. On his Sight & Sound ballot, Scheinert singled out Liu Chia-liang’s 1994 Jackie Chan sequel as his personal favorite, writing that: “Nearly every scene is unbelievably brutal, silly or spectacular.”
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“Magnolia”
Image Credit: ©New Line Cinema/Courtesy Everett Collection Scheinert showed some love to Paul Thomas Anderson on his Sight & Sound ballot, writing that Anderson’s 1999 San Fernando Valley-set epic is “Big, messy and perfect.”
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“Glory at Sea”
Image Credit: Benh Zeitlin Scheinert’s “Sight & Sound” ballot included some popular modern classics, but he wasn’t afraid to get real weird with some of his picks. He included “Beasts of the Southern Wild” director Benh Zeitlin’s little-seen 2008 short “Glory at Sea” on his list, passionately writing that “Short films are films too!”
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“Hi Stranger”
Image Credit: Kirsten Lepore Just in case Scheinert’s support for “Glory at Sea” didn’t make it clear that he loves shorts, he added another one to his Sight & Sound list to drive the point home. After picking Kirsten Lepore’s 2016 animated short, he wrote: “Rrreally short films are films too!”
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“Malcolm X”
Image Credit: © Warner Bros / courtesy Everett Collection When The Daniels visited the Criterion Closet during their “Everything Everywhere” Oscar campaign, Scheinert singled out Spike Lee’s landmark civil rights drama “Malcolm X” as one of his favorite films. The filmmaker briefly attracted attention for characterizing the biopic as a “crime film” — but since Spike doesn’t want to make an issue of it, neither should anyone else.
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