We may be reaching the end of the era in which individual movies meant something to people. In the new era, movies may just mean a barrage of images.

One of the surest signs of the Philistine is his reverence for the superior tastes of those who put him down.

Movies are so rarely great art that if we cannot appreciate great trash we have very little reason to be interested in them.

The first prerogative of an artist in any medium is to make a fool of himself.

Irresponsibility is part of the pleasure of all art; it is the part the schools cannot recognize.

If I never saw another fistfight or car chase or Doberman attack, I wouldn't have any feeling of loss. And that goes for Rottweilers, too.

The critical task is necessarily comparative, and younger people do not truly know what is new

When a picture can't make it on its own, the producers pull in a 'controversial' message - the way a couple whose marriage is falling apart decide to have a baby.

What this generation was bred to at television's knees was not wisdom, but cynicism.

If there is any test that can be applied to movies, it's that the good ones never make you feel virtuous.

Protagonists are always loners, almost by definition.

Time's up! Tomorrow just arrived.

You cannot let your parents anywhere near your real humiliations.

Peace if possible but truth at any rate.

Writing is not a profession but a vocation of unhappiness.

'The war in Iraq - if Osama was a Christian - it's the Christmas present he never would have expected.

Advice to intellectuals: let no-one represent you.

Real change happens bit by bit. It takes great effort to become effortless at anything. There are no quick fixes.

Today the financial market is no good, but the money is there.

Everyone of us has a heaven inside.

I get to do all these crazy things in the movies. I'm a pretty chilled out person, actually... a very mellow person.