I have a horror of tags and labels. I don't understand, for instance, how people can talk about Bergman's "symbolism". Far from being symbolic, be seems to me, through and almost biological naturalism, to arrive at the spiritual truth about human life that is important to him.

My purpose is to make films that will help people to live, even if they sometimes cause unhappiness.

I am convinced that any attempt to restore harmony in the world can only rest on the renewal of personal responsibility.

Perhaps the meaning of all human activity lies in the artistic consciousness, in the pointless and selfless creative act? Perhaps our capacity to create is evidence that we ourselves were created in the image and likeness of God?

A book read by a thousand different people is a thousand different books.

The film [Stalker] needs to be slower and duller at the start so that the viewers who walked into the wrong theatre have time to leave before the main action starts.

The Stalker seems to be weak, but essentially it is he who is invincible because of his faith and his will to serve others.