I was watching Monster's Ball, which is a fabulous movie. It's just a little gem: beautifully shot, and shot in a way I never would have done. It made me feel very old, really, because it wasn't eccentric for its own sake, it was just very original.

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

Their every instinct - and I have to say this is without exception - is to iron out the bumps, and It's always the bumps that are the most interesting stuff.

Always, with any movie that I do, I have a book of ideas that I've heard, or seen, or whatever, and I always try to incorporate it in the film.

The danger is that if you have a bunch of ideas that you forget to use.

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.