I hate to lose time on the set. On the set, you have to go at a good pace, because the clock is your master. For that reason, I have to know exactly what I'm trying to get beforehand.

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

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.

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.

...and remember my sentimental friend that a heart is not judged by how much you love, but by how much you are loved by others.

At least as a single woman, I had time to pursue my own interests, read voraciously, and travel when opportunity presented.

...it was amazing, wasn't it, how bad you could hurt when there was nothing physically wrong.

I've still never had a dream that I'm disabled. Never.

Once your film is done, you can't explain to people what something was supposed to be. You can't give them footnotes. It all has to be there.

If you are not criticized, you may not be doing much.

If you're making a time capsule you have to throw my album in there.

Pumps on and them little mini skirts is up. I see some good girls, Imma turn em out.

Church attendance may be dipping, but God can survive the Internet age. After all, He knows a thing or two about resurrection.

I love Superman. Because he represents the hero with 1,000 faces. And the potential that lies in every human on this planet.