The whole reason one wants to do lower budget films is because the lower the budget, the bigger the ideas, the bigger the themes, the more interesting the art.

When newspapers started to publish the box office scores of movies, I was horrified. Those results are totally fake because they never include the promotion budget.

Always make your work be personal. And, you never have to lie... There is something we know that's connected with beauty and truth. There is something ancient. We know that art is about beauty, and therefore it has to be about truth.

I was a pretty shy, lonely kid. I blossomed about age 17, when I went to college.

'Godfather' was very classical, the way it was shot, the style, the whole driving force of it was more classical, almost Shakespearean.

To make great movies, there is an element of risk. You have to say, 'Well, I am going to make this film, and it is not really a sure thing.'

Everyone knows the phenomenon of trying to hold your breath underwater - how at first it's alright and you can handle it, and then as it gets closer and closer to the time when you must breathe, how urgent the need becomes, the lust and the hunger to breathe. And then the panic sets in when you begin to think that you won't be able to breathe - and finally, when you take in air and the anxiety subsides...that's what it's like to be a vampire and need blood.