I think if you watch most of my films with the sound off, you could still tell what's going on.

What is filmmaking but groping in the dark?

If you were falling in love and you could go back in time and relive a day and see the banal things you did that you'd forgotten about, you'd weep, looking at that day.

I like actors who, when you see them on screen, you sense a person, not just an actor.

I think a badly crafted, great idea for a new film with a ton of spelling mistakes is just 100 times better than a well-crafted stale script.

There is an audience out there for literate films - slower, more observant, more human films, and they deserve to be made.

You just never know when you're living in a golden age.

The biggest fear I have is to die with regrets, and of course that will come true.

A pitfall of making a comedy with a studio-and it's also an American cultural thing-is that I get tired of being encouraged to go always for laughs.

I think cynicism lasts. Sentimentality ages, dates quickly.

If you have your movies so that everyone understands everything, I think that's probably not a very good movie.

To 'know Thyself' is considered quite an accomplishment.

Forgiveness is what makes adults different to children: children just forget, adults forgive.

Never give up on yourself.

It looks as if British democracy died a few years ago, and nobody noticed.

People say I'm extravagant because I want to be surrounded by beauty. But tell me, who wants to be surrounded by garbage?

I just have to be myself, and not worry about everyone looking at me and watching.

Religion is the most widely debated and least agreed upon phenomenon of human history.

But once I saw Fulvia Cardew crumple up a sheet of paper with just a couple of words written on it and you would’ve thought she’d murdered someone from the looks she got.

I've kind of touched on the youth generation, what the concept of fame, what does it actually, really mean.

It must require bravery to be honest all the time.