I am never driven. Every film Ive made has been an assignment.

I can't see any reason why a film shouldn't be stylized and visually beautiful. I don't think a beautiful set is pretentious.

There cannot be any communication except through form. If there is no form, you cannot create emotion in the spectator.

So I used formal techniques to make the film more perceptive emotionally.

I saw part of The Singing Detective on TV in New York. I said, Something is going on here.

I never had any special appetite for filmmaking, but you have to make a living and it is miraculous to earn a living working in film.

My films seem to be better understood and better received by the monthly publications. On television the first reactions are usually unfavorable.

It was repugnant, but it was the only way to communicate.

A viewer as opposed to a filmmaker might see a film differently. But I'm extremely comfortable with my style.

For me an unfavorable initial reaction happens fairly often. For some reason the more time that elapses after the film opens, the more favorable the reviews become.

The difference between the most dissimilar characters, between a philosopher and a common street porter, for example, seems to arise not so much from nature, as from habit, custom, and education.

There is a lot of extreme emotion in Korean film. It's because there are a lot of extremes in Korean society.

I think I feel automatically at home in Italy

Téa Obreht is the most thrilling literary discovery in years

Hillary Clinton should never have been allowed to run for the presidency based on what she did with e-mails and so many other things.

Poor in abundance, famish'd at a feast.

What a torment it is to see so much loveliness passing and repassing before us, and yet not dare to lay hold of it!

For courage, there must be something at stake. I come here with nothing to lose.

There is this inherent human instinct that the usual way you control trolling is you force people to use their real identities. So there's less trolling on Facebook, for example.

But in this country it is necessary, now and then, to put one admiral to death in order to inspire the others to fight.