9. It’s A Wonderful Life

It’s the favourite film of our new culture minister? Oh, for fuck’s sake. I know Capra is a bit obvious. But I think there is a massive pleasure in sitting in the dark crying with strangers. Whether that is Like Father, Like Son or Departures – which is amazing, a Japanese film about a cellist who became an embalmer, which could easily be in my list. There are very few films where people applaud at the end at a screening at Broadway, and this one they always do.

I have been fighting with my editor recently about feeling Christmassy [Finlay’s next film, Pantomime, is about "the longest running and lowest budget pantomime in Nottingham"] . I like feeling Christmassy, I believe in Christmas and I want some of that in my film, but he doesn’t. I just fell in love with Jimmy Stewart watching this film. It takes you on a whole journey and it makes you value one man’s life. It can be seen as trite and chocolate box-y, but there is so much that is incredibly dark. He is such a crotchety old shit before his transformation. I like films where you can feel completely different about the character by the end, you realise how far you have come with them. Another underdog, another outsider – it is a running theme.