Never treat anything you do as a stepping stone. Do it fully, and follow it completely.

If we don't tell our own stories, no one else will.

Making films is about having absolute and foolish confidence; the challenge for all of us is to have the heart of a poet and the skin of an elephant.

It is because my roots are so strong that I can fly.

What is really important to me is a sense of humour and a mischief about life. Life is just too boring otherwise.

We all know the power of film; we all know there's almost nothing more powerful than to see people on film that look and talk like you, like we do.

We have to realize only in communication, in real knowledge, in real reaching out, can there be an understanding that there's humanity everywhere, and that's what I'm trying to do.

Christmas lights may be the loneliest thing for me, especially if you mix them up with reindeers and sleighs. I feel alone. I feel isolated. I feel I do not belong.

I am still attracted to stories about people who are considered to be on the outside of society. I still seek inspiration from those stories.

I grew up in a small town in India, but through books I knew the world.

'Salaam Bombay' didn't put a halo on the poor. Instead, it said that they will teach us how to live.

You don’t have to worry about getting the attention of others when you’re good at what you do.

Look at the woebegone walk of him. Eaten a bad egg. Poached eyes on ghost.

Balance is the secret of reaching the far places!

I believe the novella is the perfect form of prose fiction.

Shaft was a pop culture figure along t he lines of, I guess, Dirty Harry - except that he wasn't as much of a racist. So yeah, I was always a fan.

Things a mother should know: how to comfort a son without exactly saying Daddy was wrong.

Spiritual progress is like a detoxification.

I don't think about the trials and the Olympics a lot. If I do, it's just going to stress me out and get me worried.

What brings two people together anyway?

We need new cultural scripts. Women don't say what we want, and we don't say what we don't want. Unless we're reacting to a stranger, we generally aren't great at turning down someone's advance.