It's funny: half my films were flops, half did well. It would be terrible if I'd had only success.

Each time I hit a low point I learn the most. Failure is the best university.

I sometimes follow people who attract my curiosity in the street for five, ten minutes.

The constant in my films is love stories. I consider love the chief business of humanity.

People are too pretentious in France to like Sarkozy. But he'd be a fabulous president for America.

Hollwood creates useful entertainment. There are millions of people on earth who need distraction and American cinema fulfills that function.

You have to strike hard from the beginning and create a depressurizing zone between the viewer's own life and the one onscreen. The creators of James Bond got it right: the attention-grabbing scene of each Bond movie is the very first one, before the opening credits.