Edgar Wright Plays My Favorite Scene; Do You Feel Lucky?

When filmmaker Edgar Wright returns to Los Angeles this weekend to curate his second guest programming run at the New Beverly Cinema, he's bringing more of his favorite films to share. The first time Wright brought his encyclopedic film knowledge to the local institution back in 2007, his fortnight of cult and genre double features packed the house and kicked off a spate of popular guest programming series by the likes of Eli Roth, Joe Dante and Jason Reitman. Now Wright's back to present over two weeks of double bills including paired screenings of Brazil & Delicatessen (Jan. 16-17), American Graffiti & Animal House (Jan. 20-21), Wild at Heart & True Romance (Jan. 26-27), and more - and it all begins with an already sold-out triple feature of Wright's own Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (Jan. 14-15).

Movieline caught up with Wright via telephone to discuss his guest programming return to the New Beverly, officially dubbed The Wright Stuff II. (Check back tomorrow for our full chat.) Challenged with a round of My Favorite Scene, the avowed film nut looked no further than his own upcoming guest programming slate and chose one of the best four-minute scenes in the history of great four-minute scenes.

But first, a caveat: "It would be silly to pick, because they're kind of all my favorites, really," Wright protested. "I've often said that Raising Arizona is my favorite film of all time, but I showed that last time [as part of his first programming series at the New Beverly]. These are all my favorites -- that's why I'm showing them!"

Forced to choose, he zeroed in on a classic scene. "Probably the one I've watched the most out of these movies is Dirty Harry," Wright mused. "I can't tell you the number of times I've seen it.

"It's got to be the bank robbery scene, with his 'Do you feel lucky?' speech. It's amazing. Not so much for that famous speech as for Albert Popwell, who plays the bank robber and has the immortal line, 'I gots to know!'" And it seems like "gots to" is spelled g-o-t-s-t, which I always thought was brilliant."

Do you feel lucky, readers? Below, watch Dirty Harry Callahan stop a bank robbery, and scarf down a hot dog, in record time. (Dirty Harry screens Jan. 18-19 as part of The Wright Stuff II series. More info here.)