The Scene: Great Missenden, about an hour outside of London -- the Platonic ideal of the English countryside village, lined with perfectly tended row houses and gardens. It's home to Roald Dahl's estate and the Roald Dahl Museum, which today is overrun by international press who've gathered to interview the cast and crew of Fantastic Mr. Fox -- Wes Anderson's stop-motion adaptation of the Dahl classic. At The Nags Head Pub, Bill Murray pours pints for starstruck onlookers from behind the bar, as a small group of journalists sit around a table grilling Anderson on his animated opus. It seemed as good a moment as any to play My Favorite Scene with the director -- though I must admit we never saw his answer coming.
"The first that jumps into my mind," he responded, without a moment's hesitation, "is there's a scene from Rosemary's Baby where -- let's see -- they've had a dinner together. And she's been complaining about these pains that she had and she wants to switch to a new doctor and they have this argument.
"And in the middle of the argument, these pains stop. And he's kind of freaked out, and she kind of has this look on her face, and we don't know what's happening. And it's one shot and the way it's staged, it's the most perfectly staged scene. That's the scene that comes into my mind."
Polanski's Satanic maternity masterpiece may seem an odd choice for a filmmaker promoting a charmingly precocious family film, but as always in My Favorite Scene, there are no wrong answers. But would he still stand by the statement of support he added his name to shortly after the director's Swiss ambush?
"You recently signed the petition in support of Roman Polanski," I asked. "Do you still support that decision?"
"Yeah," he replied, with confidence.
Here's Anderson's favorite film scene: