You always have to be very aware that the audience is extremely ruthless in its demand for newness, novelty and freshness.

I have to believe that when my eyes are closed, the world's still there. (Leonard Shelby, Memento)

I always thought the joy of reading a book is not knowing what happens next. (Leonard Shelby, Memento)

You're never going to learn something as profoundly as when it's purely out of curiosity

A camera is a camera, a shot is a shot, how you tell the story is the main thing.

I like films that continue to spin your head in all sorts of different directions after you've seen them.

You musn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.

One of the things you do as a writer and as a filmmaker is grasp for resonant symbols and imagery without necessarily fully understanding it yourself.

Every film should have its own world, a logic and feel to it that expands beyond the exact image that the audience is seeing.

Every great story deserves a great ending

I've always believed that if you want to really try and make a great film, not a good film, but a great film, you have to take a lot of risks.

His sadness was of the kind that is patient and without hope.

Suddenly, I’m lighter, only half of who I was.

Work done with little effort is likely to yield little result.

By the time I was in my early-twenties and was living there on the Lower East Side, I was so surrounded by tragedy that I think that inspired me to try to reflect it in the artwork.

I promised to always bring up a glass of water to her before we go to bed, and she promised to never let me dress myself.

I have always reckoned myself among the greatest admirers of Mozart, and shall do so till the day of my death.

I would love to option 'Crying of Lot 49 and turn it into a movie.

September 11 was a godsend for Israel. It could now conjoin its merciless persecution of the Palestinians with Bush's War against Terror. But my impression is that it wasn't altogether successful.

I feel that the single-minded pursuit of wealth has led the middle classes into a crisis.

The difference breeds hatred.