A movie is like a tip of an iceberg, in a way, because so little of what you do in connection with making a movie actually gets into the movie. Almost everything gets left behind.

Maybe existence is ultimately a lonely thing.

I like to think that one of things I've done with non-fiction since the very beginning is to find new ways of telling true stories.

Philip Glass once told me, "They can always copy what you've done, but they can't copy what you're going to do."

I probably wouldn't have done [ Fred Leuchter story] if it was just a story about an executioner or a holocaust denier, but the combination of the two elements was irresistible. So yeah, I find it strange that there are so many people out there now.

You can think of my films as cautionary tales, but you might even think of them as despairing tales, because at least in a cautionary tale, you have this idea that by listening to the story you can assure a better outcome. Whereas I'm not at all convinced that's the case. In fact, if anything, I'm convinced that it's the opposite.

I don't think that anybody really makes films quite like mine. That's maybe true of any filmmaker.