I was 12 when my parents told me we were moving to Lebanon. I remember thinking, 'Leba-who?' I had absolutely no concept of the place.

Cat lovers turn into cat collectors.

When I look back on my childhood, I think of that short time in Beirut. I know that seeing the city collapse around me forced me to grasp something many people miss: the fragility of peace.

Part of filmmaking is always a guessing game, and part of it is always a game of trust.

She is such a scene-stealer. She's got these lashes and big eyes, and when she walks on to the set everybody just says "ooh."

I don't consider a lot of actors that I really admire movie stars.

I was just a quiet kid, really. I wasn't the class clown at all.

If you're working on a movie, you want it to be projected on the largest tapestry possible, and the sound to be perfect, and for that kind of communal experience of the movies to take place for it.

I really don't make a concerted effort to try to find a type of role.

I've never had a clear road map. When things come along, I benefit.

I can't not find humor in elements of most parts of life, but at the same time nothing ever seems perpetually funny to me.

When I was younger, I used to hate Germany. I hated the country, the people, the language, the culture, everything! But over the years I've grown to really appreciate the German people.

Vermouth always makes me brilliant unless it makes me idiotic.

You're financially independent if you have $15,000 coming in and $14,900 going out.

The wine they drink in Paradise They make in Haute Lorraine.

I like situations that force me to rethink things.

An educated mind is practiced in the uses of reason, which inevitably leads to a skeptical outlook.

Only with the death it comes what's new, if the germen doesn't die, the plant will not be born.

However wretched a fellow-mortal may be, he is still a member of our common species.

Admitting one's ignorance is the first step in acquiring knowledge.

Thank God, I can look at a sunset now without having to think how to describe it