As a first-time director, you cannot have final cut. But as a producer, you can have final cut.

When I was a teenager there was no video in my country. Betamax came to Mexico very slowly.

But I think we are seeing a resurgence of the graphic ghost story like The Others, Devil's Backbone and The Sixth Sense. It is a return to more gothic atmospheric ghost storytelling.

In a world where we are so pragmatic and materialistic, fear is the only emotion that allows even a sophisticated person to believe in something beyond.

You only find yourself when you disobey. Disobedience is the beginning of responsibility, I think.

The butterfly does not look back upon its caterpillar self, either fondly or wistfully; it simply flies on.

If you're not operating on an instinctive level, you're not an artist.... Reason over emotion is bullshit, absolute bullshit... We suffocate ourselves in rules. I find fantasy liberating.

I have a sort of a fetish for insects, clockwork, monsters, dark places, and unborn things

Well, the first thing is that I love monsters, I identify with monsters.

You have to believe the magic to see it.

Night is real. Night is not an absence of light, but in fact, it is daytime that is a brief respite from the looming darkness.

The only man meant to be in your life is a man that knows your worth.

You see, Kenny, there are some things you don't even know you know, until you're asked.

The future's unwritten. It's what we make of it.

A thought, once uttered, is untrue

Pay bad people with your goodness; fight their hatred with your kindness. Even if you do not achieve a victory over other people, you will conquer yourself.

When I very first started out, I had that arrogance of youth.

The center of the stage is where I am.

Science is uncertain.

Half the people who snuff people, that's what they want: recognition. Get their picture in the paper.

Nothing else is all right.” His whisper tickles my cheek. “But we are.