There's nothing worse than the frustration of having somebody who you feel doesn't get what you're doing, trying to turn it into something else. It's a very, very annoying and sort of frustrating thing and I just never wanted to go through it. I was very fortunate as I came up through the film business that I was able to insulate myself from that.

I think that's an obligation you have, to give back no matter what happens. It actually ends up being easier when you're young than when you become successful. Suddenly you realize you've gone into a whole other realm of philanthropy, from just being a volunteer to being this person that dedicates buildings and saves lots of children in some faraway place.

I came from a very avant-garde documentary kind of film making world. I like cinema verité, documentaries. I liked non-story, non-character tone poems. And that's the film making that I was interested in.

Follow your bliss. Do the thing where you sit down at 8 a.m. and then you realize you're hungry and you look up and it's 10 p.m. If you can find something you love that much, it doesn't matter what you do.

People look at technology as sometimes an end to things, and it isn't an end in certain cases. In the movie business, the act of creating in the art form of movies, the craft of movies is completely technical, and that's all it is.

It's now time for me to pass Star Wars on to a new generation of filmmakers. I've always believed that Star Wars could live beyond me, and I thought it was important to set up the transition during my lifetime.

One of the amazing things about 'Seven Samurai' is that there are a lot of characters. And considering you have so many, and they all have shaved heads, and you've got good guys and bad guys and peasants, you get to understand a lot of them without too much being said.