For me, the most important word in cinema is the word freedom. For example, in Europe, we've got freedom, we've got the final cut and that's something which is marvellous.

It's always more interesting and more difficult to make something positive than negative. To be negative is very easy.

I like the cinema of people like Terry Gilliam and Tim Burton. I am not keen on trying to reproduce reality - for that you should do documentaries.

I believe in imagination. I was a worker when I was 17. Between 17 and 21, I was a worker in the telephone company and imagination saved my life.

It's always been pretty easy for me to exercise my imagination. The other part of the brain, the one that does mathematics, is a nightmare for me. It doesn't work at all.

I've never made any concessions, so I am 100% responsible for my films. This makes me feel very proud.

All day my mind drifts off into fantasies and little stupid jokes.

In the States, I learned to fight for every idea. Sometimes, a director has to be a tyrant to keep the quality.

If you make the right choice in casting, your work is nearly done already. You don't have to spend a lot of time directing the actors, because they're so well suited to the parts.

I like looking back at people's faces in the dark. I like noticing details that no one else sees. But I hate it in the old American movies when drivers don't watch the road.

In general, I have some precise ideas about everything, because the film is completed in my head before we ever start shooting. With casting, I am always present, even for the smallest character.

It takes sunshine and rain to make a rainbow. There would be no rainbows without sunshine and rain.

You will definitely reap whatever you have sown

I don't know about them, but I sure am. I'm out for revenge.

When you're young, you're not afraid of what comes next. You're excited by it.

I might have enjoyed the company of a woman or two... Or three but that had never stopped me from loving you.

If any performer has quality in his voice he can almost always be helped to develop all the other necessary attributes.

I look in music magazines now and see things on Luther Allison, and my name's getting out there more, thanks to all the good people at Alligator Records and at my management company.

With few words I shall make thee understand my soul.

I called my training camp Fighter's Heaven

The idea of Jewish settlements under Palestinian sovereignty, as was suggested by someone in the Prime Minister's office, is very dangerous and reflects an irrationality of values.