One sign of a great actor is when he can be alone by himself on the screen, doing almost nothing, and producing one of a film's defining moments.

Every great film should seem new every time you see it.

No good movie is too long and no bad movie is short enough.

One difference between film noir and more straightforward crime pictures is that noir is more open to human flaws and likes to embed them in twisty plot lines.

To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts.

You can have a movie with hardly any cuts, or very few cuts, that is fascinating, you can't take your eyes away from it... Look at some of the long takes in Citizen Kane.

I lost faith in the Oscars the first year I was a movie critic - the year that Bonnie and Clyde didn't win.

I believe empathy is the most essential quality of civilization.

I think we have to get beyond the idea that we have to categorize people.

What every human being should do is eat a vegetarian diet based on whole foods. Period. That's it. Animal protein is bad for you. Dairy is bad for you. Forget the ads: Milk and eggs are bad for you.

I do not fear death. I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear.

Learn to cherish the chase as much as you treasure the trophy.

Men are not dogs. We merely think we are and, on occasion, act as if we are. But, by believing in our nobler nature, women have the amazing power to inspire us to live up to it.

I'd learned balance is internal

We're both cat lovers [with Marilyn Manson].

Most women lament not the death of their lovers so much out of real affection for them, as because they would appear worthy of love.

Now and then when I get an idea for a picture, I think, how ordinary. Why paint that old rock? Why not go for a walk instead? But then I realise that to someone else it may not seem so ordinary.

The perfidious, savage, disdainful, stupid, slothful, inhospitable, stupid English.

Tell me what ticks you off, and I will tell you what makes you tick.

In Stalinism, everybody was potentially a victim in a totally contingent way.

I think it's always good when you're able to, as an actor, allow your work to be some kind of a conduit for social discourse, and an examination of where we are, as a society.