A lot of first novels are written long before they're actually put down on paper.

Every great film should seem new every time you see it.

No good movie is too long and no bad movie is short enough.

One difference between film noir and more straightforward crime pictures is that noir is more open to human flaws and likes to embed them in twisty plot lines.

To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts.

You can have a movie with hardly any cuts, or very few cuts, that is fascinating, you can't take your eyes away from it... Look at some of the long takes in Citizen Kane.

I lost faith in the Oscars the first year I was a movie critic - the year that Bonnie and Clyde didn't win.

I believe empathy is the most essential quality of civilization.

I think we have to get beyond the idea that we have to categorize people.

What every human being should do is eat a vegetarian diet based on whole foods. Period. That's it. Animal protein is bad for you. Dairy is bad for you. Forget the ads: Milk and eggs are bad for you.

I do not fear death. I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear.

Errors do not cease to be errors simply because they’re ratified into law.

Writing starts with living.—Rumors of Water: Thoughts on Creativity & Writing

We all go through sad times, but I was brought up to be positive.

Religion is not the belief there is a god. Religion is the belief god tells you what to do.

What do I bring to the Democratic National Convention that other reporters don't? Hair.

Love is only a feeling of curiousity more or less intense, grafted upon the inclination placed in us by nature that the species may be preserved.

Water symbolizes the whole of potentiality - the source of all possible existence.

[First line] “The business of murder took time, patience, skill, and a tolerance for the monotonous.

We must be lovers, and at once the impossible becomes possible.

But the suit I wear is my work attire, and nothing else.