Life in the movie business is like the beginning of a new love affair: it's full of surprises, and you're constantly getting f***ed.

Films have degenerated to their original operation as carnival amusement - they offer not drama but thrills.

The Oscars demonstrate the will of the people to control and judge those they have elected to stand above them (much, perhaps, as in bygone days, an election celebrated the same).

Every scene should be able to answer three questions: "Who wants what from whom? What happens if they don't get it? Why now?"

When the three branches of government have failed to represent the citizenry and the mass of the media has failed to represent the citizenry, then the citizenry better represent the citizenry.

Forget narrative, backstory, characterisation, exposition, all of that. Just make the audience want to know what happens next.

It is the writer’s job to make the play interesting. It is the actor’s job to make the performance truthful.

Opportunity may knock, but it seldom nags.

We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie.

People may or may not say what they mean... but they always say something designed to get what they want.

Being a writer in Hollywood is like going to Hitler's Eagle Nest with a great idea for a bar mitzvah.

There is a rule for fantasy writers: The more truth you mix in with a lie, the stronger it gets.

You are not controlling the storm, and you are not lost in it. You are the storm.

Forget yesterday, Act on Today and Get a hold on tomorrow.

Helplessness becomes prayer the moment that you go to Jesus and speak candidly and confidently with him about your needs. This is to believe.

It is really hard for me to invest time into a relationship because I get kind of freaked out by the thought of doing something that part of my mind keeps telling me is "unproductive".

We'd been trying to touch the sky from the bottom of the ocean. I realized that if we boosted one another, maybe we'd get a little closer.

I tend to go against the grain because when I start to see that everybody's trying to shock, I try not to. I just do stuff that's subtler, more emotional, and I think that shocks people.

I'm telling you that you don't have to choose between smart and sexy. You can have both. You are both.

This generation should entertain this generation. It's only fair. When I was a kid, I mowed the lawn. Now, somebody else's kid can mow the lawn.

It were better for a man to be subject to any vice than to drunkenness; for all other vanities and sins are recovered, but a drunkard will never shake off the delight of beastliness.