Movies are social and novels are private, and this difference is as essential as the addition of visuals and sound in storytelling. Movies are collaborative creations, novels are written by one. We watch movies together, you can’t ever really read a novel with another person. Reading a novel is always a private moment between you and the author. If you’ve never had that sense the author of the book you are reading must have read your mind somehow, you’re just not reading the right books.

People who really love movies, and from time to time I am one of them, are always trying to get that sense of one-on-one novelistic intimacy. My favorite way to start a weekend is to wake up Saturday at an ungodly hour, 5 am or so, make espresso and watch a film that will make me think. At that hour, watching a film feels less like passively enjoying a work of art than something you imagined and took part in. A hypnagogic revelation.

You see a movie with your friend, go out for drinks afterward, and this disrupts the process of letting it sink in. The best thing to do after a film…is to walk around, aimlessly, when the city’s yet to wake up and you run no risk of your thoughts interrupted by people asking for directions, catcalling, wanting your attention.