I'd say to anyone trying to break into the business: Don't just be interested in movies. Be interested in life. Be a person. Be in touch.

We, as film-makers, are privileged. We can make people cry or laugh. We can make them think and feel. It is a great privilege and a great responsibility.

There is a very particular feeling I get when I have the camera in my hand, looking at an actor talk, knowing that what I’m shooting will end up on the screen.

I've been in wars and in riots and hung out of many helicopters in the early days. And there's a detachment that happens when you look through the camera. You're looking for the shot.

Most people, I believe, when they're asked profound questions about their own persona are not really able to enunciate it, because it's a combination of so many things.

I am part of a system which encourages people to buy things and do things which are not to their best interest.

I felt that that experience, because of the responsible nature that I found I acted all during that traumatic time, that I felt that I was a man.

My mother let me know that we're all connected. If some of us become more affluent it's not because we're better or even smarter people - we have a responsibility to ourselves to be a good boy.

Not one Wall Street executive has been charged with crimes since the 2008 financial crash.

From my image of digging around in the mud like a grunt, I preferred fighting the war from ships.

If you're making commercials which sell products which are unhealthy or which are unnecessary, I think that you are part of a system.

Lincoln's leadership is based on a number of precepts, but my favorite one is that he acted in the name, and for the good, of the people.

The less I needed, the better I felt.

All writing is a form of manipulation, of course, but you realize that a plain sentence can actually do so much.

You can't eat [literature], that's the problem," he said. "I've tried, it's very dry, and not at all nutritious.

You need a fantastic memory in this game to remember the great shots and a very short memory to forget the bad ones.

I know you have much to bear with in me, and I really do sometimes in you, but I have never looked at friendship in a deep sense as easy or entirely comfortable.

The Tibetan missionaries in their mood of bright confidence disconcerted the imperial governments by laughing the new movement into frustration. For a sham faith cannot stand ridicule.

The only Zen you can find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there.

When you first awaken or before drifting off to sleep, quiet your mind, lift up your heart, muse, mull over, make discoveries. Consider, conceive, create, connect, concede that it all starts within.

The big print giveth and the small print taketh away.