Clearly, you can think back and see that a character has had enormous odds stacked against him and has to overcome them. It's usually a guy, I'm afraid. But then you're setting up a new movie you have amnesia about these meetings, when you've discussed it more analytically.

The great thing with film is that it doesn't have an ego. It's just a film. Everybody that makes them has an ego, and the problem with awards and stuff like that is that it always affects the egos, and everyone gets stained by it in some way. And that can be fine and very innocent, but it can be horrible as well.

I kind of call myself an atheist, I suppose - although quite a spiritual atheist, I hope.

If I was American, I think I'd live in New York, because I like that East Coast mentality. There's nothing wrong with Hollywood. If you want to be a big time filmmaker, you should go to Hollywood.

Come a crisis, we want other people.

Movies are about time. You can take that momentum and manipulate time as well, or you can deliberately slow it down, stop it, and start it again. There is no other art form that does that type of manipulation in that way.

If you approach India in the right way, you have so much to learn there about people, and there's so many people. It's such an extraordinary setup, and it's so bewildering how it manages to get through somehow, you can only wonder at it.