Since my adaptation of Ian McEwan's 'Atonement,' I get sent a lot of novels that people think will work as movies. So every now and then I make a point of sitting down and reading a couple of them.

It's possible to disagree with someone about the ethics of non-violence without wanting to kick his face in.

If I had to give a definition of capitalism I would say: the process whereby American girls turn into American women.

A great number of the disappointments and mishaps of the troubled world are the direct result of literature and the allied arts. It is our belief that no human being who devotes his life and energy to the manufacture of fantasies can be anything but fundamentally inadequate.

If you take a really good book, then the potential is for a really good film. But you've got to get it right.

There is a sort of theory that you should adapt bad books because they always make more successful films.

It's great to get out of the study and work with real living and breathing people.