I like action films, not exclusively, but I like Samurai films. I like Westerns. Not so much war pictures, but a few. I like kinetic cinema.

I think about what movie I would like to see. I don't think of them as a correction or palliative. I certainly am irritated by anything that's shot in the Midwest and filled with these noble people. "Oh, they're so good, and they're so honest..." I'm not interested in that. I just think of what's right for a movie.

In real life, I myself am kind of a rambling guy. I like to travel.

I always think about visual comedy. I was raised watching silents, and I'm always thinking about how to make cinema, not good talking - although I want good talking. I'm much more interested in framing, composition, and orchestration of bodies in space, and so forth. My goal is always what Chuck Jones wanted his Warner Brothers cartoons to be, which was if you turn down the sound, you could still tell what's going on.

I like to think of film-making not just as an act of personal self-aggrandisement but rather as an act of public service.

But it's just that the whole country is making generally lousy films these days and has been for quite a while. That's the big problem that we all have to think about.

It seems that our politicians see the world in black and white, so why not our artists? Did Woody Allen's 'Manhattan' have to be in black and white? No. But is it fantastic that it was? To see New York like that? Yes!