The snake kills by squeezing very slowly. This is how the civilized world slowly, slowly pushes into the forest and takes away the world that used to be.

I love it when I have a nightmare to me that means I got my money's worth out of that eight hours

The literature now is so opaque to the average person that you couldn't take a science-fiction short story that's published now and turn it into a movie. There'd be way too much ground work you'd have to lay. It's OK to have detail and density, but if you rely on being a lifelong science-fiction fan to understand what the story is about, then it's not going to translate to a broader audience.

I had pictured myself as a filmmaker but I had never pictured myself as a director if that makes any sense at all.

Hate is a disease, and in 1930 I became sick with hatred.

God wears white flannels.

Religions fulfill deep-seated psychological needs for people, and if you don't get it from a specific religious doctrine, you'll get it from the kind of films I like to make. A film like The Terminator is consciously meant to give a sense of empowerment to the individual.