Well, Brief Encounter is certainly one of my top five favorites of all time. I looked at Brief Encounter very closely, to be honest.

What I think is interesting is that the more you do, you have to invent a book of rules of what you can do and what you can't do. And the very real danger is that if your book of rules becomes a book of cliches.

Somebody said that I'm a bit like a sponge, grabbing things here and there, soaking stuff up. [As a director] you have to be, really.

If you are prepared to make a fool of yourself for them then you usually get that back. I think that there are points where you become so close to an actor, you know them so well, almost as well or better than their spouse. You have to know them, warts and all.

I wanted to make a movie about the arbitrary nature of love.

It's the sort of subject that always interests me: jealousy and the language of suspicion and guilt. I think it interests people.

I think you get better at staring into space. Especially living in the South of France.