I was that kind of kid that was going to the movies every weekend, I couldnt get enough of the movies, and now I get to make them. So I kind of have a one-track mind.

The greatest story commandment is: Make me care.

Use what you know. Draw from it. It doesnt always mean plot or fact. It means capturing a truth from your experiencing it, expressing values you personally feel deep down in your core.

The best stories infuse wonder.

Don't give [the audience] four; give them two plus two.

I never think about the audience. If someone gives me a marketing report, I throw it away.

Loneliness is, I think, people's biggest fear, whether they are conscious of it or not.

Frankly, there isn't anyone you couldn't learn to love once you've heard their story.

That's what great art does - it inspires other artists to do great art, and that's what it should do.

Drama is anticipation mingled with uncertainty.

Change is fundamental in story. If things go static, stories die.

Don’t blame any one, including you. There is something called destiny.

This life is full of vanity

I was very productive as a senator for my state.

A good rule of thumb is if you've made it to 35 and your job still requires you wear a nametag, you've probably made a serious vocational error.

But i think it would drive me more crazy to just go do a movie that I didn't believe in, you know?

If psychoanalysis clarifies some facts of sexuality, it is not by aiming at them in their own reality, not in biological experience.

One girl is worth more use than 20 boys.

I want to be remembered as a great actor - and a shining example of humanity.

A traveller, lost on a desert plain, feels that the recognition of one star, the Pole star, is of itself a great acquisition.

The nation is prosperous on the whole, but how much prosperity is there in a hole?