I'm not into extreme sports or something. I just live a quiet life.

You are what you love. Not what loves you.

I think of myself as a guy who tries to write screenplays and now has tried to direct one. Anything more than that is meaningless and it gets in the way of being a real human being.

I do like escapism. I like going to the movies on a Friday night and seeing something fun.

The only honest and generous thing for me to do is to give people myself. That's all I've got as an artist, so I want to do that in an unflinching way.

The passionate ones, the ones who go after what they want, may not get what they want, but they remain vital, in touch with themselves, and when they lie on their deathbeds, they have few regrets.

Everything I've written is personal - it's the only way I know how to write.

You and I share the same DNA. Is there anything more lonely than that?

Why do I fall in love with every woman I see that shows me the least bit of attention?

Clementine: This is it, Joel. It's going to be gone soon. Joel: I know. Clementine: What do we do? Joel: Enjoy it.

There are nearly thirteen million people in the world. None of those people is an extra. They're all the leads of their own stories. They have to be given their due.

What is carved on rocks were away in time. What is told from mouth to mouth will live forever.

Baby steps count, as long as you are going forward. You add them all up, and one day you look back and you'll be surprised at where you might get to.

Lots of small business men have been contacting me to say they wish they had the nerve to say what I said.

Analyze thy life's experiences, see thy shortcomings, see thy virtues. Minimize those faults, magnify and glorify thy virtues.

I think acting is about forgetting yourself in order to give the best of yourself. It's passing through you more than you're creating it. You're not the flower, but the vase which holds the flower.

The man who thinks he knows does not yet know what knowing is

As writers become more numerous, it is natural for readers to become more indolent; whence must necessarily arise a desire of attaining knowledge with the greatest possible ease.

The Cold War went on for so long that it bred a kind of worldwide military establishment. Even when budgets went down in the early and mid-nineties, it didn't really affect it.

Ain't a woman alive that could take my mama's place

Language is the spiritual exhalation of the nation.