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.'

You're in a profession in which absolutely everybody is telling you their opinion, which is different. That's one of the reasons George Lucas never directed again.

When I was going for my graduate degree, I decided I was going to make a feature film as my thesis. That's what I was famous for-that I had my thesis film be a feature film, which was 'You're a Big Boy Now.'

When I was about 9, I had polio, and people were very frightened for their children, so you tended to be isolated. I was paralyzed for a while, so I watched television.

Usually, the stuff that's your best idea or work is going to be attacked the most.

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

Whom God wishes to destroy, He first makes successful in show business.