It's really hard to find just a simple character-driven drama, outside of a genre, that was available to direct, except for on TV.

I just like that dynamic in relationships in movies where they're kind of lovers as rivals, you know?

When you dont inherit an identity you have to define it on your own.

I always remembered that when I saw people get married they got on a rocketship and went to Planet Happiness, Population: Them.

It's very important to keep the emotions grounded, to keep the characters in some real place.

Audiences can tell when you're being fake and they will eat you alive. But if you're doing something authentic they will connect to it and that can lead to commercial success.

Sundance is a really special place. They're very protective of movies, especially lower-budget movies.

There's a punk rock quality to Peter Parker, that I identified with when I read the comics [Spider-Man], and that I really liked. He has this chip on his shoulder.

When you have to react to a lizard that's a tennis ball, it's a really, really difficult, tricky piece of craft.

Something you can do in a comic that you can't do in a film is that you can have thought bubbles.

There's a bigger universe at hand.

For someone who loved words as much as I did, it was amazing how often they failed me.

I believe death is only a door. One closes, and another opens. If I were to imagine heaven, I would imagine a door opening. And he would be waiting for me there.

My fans want my shirt. They can have my shirt. They put it on my back.

Not only is health a normal condition, but it is our duty not only to attain it but to maintain it.

I don't like violence.

Knowing what I do now, I don't know if I'd ever have the balls to go to film school, with no connections and no knowledge of the business side at all.

Alcohol is a misunderstood vitamin.

Levi's smile broke free and devoured his whole face. It started to devour her face, too. Cath had to look away.

There is no country on earth that has done more for our own poor and for the poor around the world. We are not the ones that need to be targeted.

...the reality of intelligent British speech... uses blasphemus, coital and cloacal expletives as a matter of course.