When I cook, my brain stops completely.

My philosophy is very simple. To feel young, you must work as long as you can.

The audience wants to be attracted not by the critics, but by a great story. You must deliver to the audience emotion - and when I say emotion, I mean suspense, drama, love.

I see my face in the mirror, and I said, No, my ambition is not to be an actor.

After The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal, the audience would like to know where, when, and who arrests Hannibal Lecter for the first time. This is the story of Red Dragon.

I realized the exciting place was behind the camera with the producer, director and so on.

You have to kill the bad guy.

I always say my age is connected with three Cs. In here, cuore, which means the heart. Up here, cervello, which is the brain. And, of course, down here: the coglioni. I no feel my age, I tell you.

If no producer, no movie.

Making movies is all about instinct.

If you get a book which is 600 pages, you have to reduce it to a script of 100 pages. In two hours of film, you cannot possibly include all the characters.

People are only rational on the surface.

I think that society has to be careful not to shift all of its resources to the elderly versus the young. I get very concerned when people talk about cutting education budgets.

If a state, or nation, has laws it will not enforce for political reasons, it mocks both the law and politics, to say nothing of the cultural order.

It’s funny – my married friends tell me all the time, 'What you have is so much easier.' When you’re doing it on your own, you don't have to [argue over] how you're raising the kids.

I'm going to be in technology for a long time.

The habit of being uniformly considerate toward others will bring to you increased happiness.

If you really thought about who you are, who God is, and how much thanks you owe Him, you would want to go to Mass. The Mass would become the source and center of your spiritual life.

Oh, that we could but convince men and women that murmuring spirit is a greater evil than any affliction, whatever the affliction!

Whenever I dream about flying, it's the best feeling in the world.

The more we can get together and talk about various perspectives, feelings, beliefs, the better.