When I used Claudia [Cardinale] for example, in Once Upon a Time in the West, she represented the birth of American matriarchy. Because women had enormous weight in America.

When I was young, I believed in three things: Marxism, the redemptive power of cinema, and dynamite. Now I just believe in dynamite.

In my childhood, America was like a religion. Then, real-life Americans abruptly entered my life - in jeeps - and upset all my dreams.

My life, my reading, everything about me revolves around the cinema. So for me, cinema is life, and vice-versa.

The important thing is to make a different world, to make a world that is not now. A real world, a genuine world, but one that allows myth to live. The myth is everything.

When you manage to express something with a look and the music instead of saying it with words or having the character speak, I think it's a more complete work.

Where life had no value, death, sometimes, had its price. That is why the bounty killers appeared.

Probably the greatest writer of westerns himself was Homer. His character were never all good or all bad. They're half and half, these characters, as all human beings are.

You see in Once Upon a Time in the West the whole film moves around her [Claudia Cardinale]. If you take her out, there's no more film. She's the central motor of the entire happening.

There are directors, and there are authors. I think I am more of an author than a director.

I can't see America any other way than with a European's eyes. It fascinates me and terrifies me at the same time.

You know how hard it is to feel like an extreme falcon-headed combat machine when somebody calls you "chicken man"?

You create your own masterpiece as your actions draw pictures of your life canvas.

Readers always seem to think that the author has some control over the design of their books.

I do what I feel is right. I do not fear to walk on a new path and take risk.

Perfection is impossible. Trying to do your best is important, but loving yourself and loving others should come first.

Growth and fulfillment come from abandoning old practices and embracing new ones.

It seems to me that even the least of the human race is touched with genius when mad with love.

The fact is fossil fuel carbon will stay in the surface climate system for millennia.

My only real daydreamy casting over the years has been Natalie Portman for Denna. She's an amazing actress, and Denna is going to be one of the hardest characters to pull off.

Never write a poem about anything that ought to have a poem written about it.