For me, the most important word in cinema is the word freedom. For example, in Europe, we've got freedom, we've got the final cut and that's something which is marvellous.

When you speak about generosity, about something good we have inside ourselves, you're speaking to the majority.

I write scripts by myself. It's not for everybody. It's someone's personal work. I need to be in love with the subject.

I like the cinema of people like Terry Gilliam and Tim Burton. I am not keen on trying to reproduce reality - for that you should do documentaries.

Each time, I try to find a family of interesting faces. I follow the tradition of films from the 40s - at this time, there were so many interesting faces in France. I often work with the same because there are not thousands and thousands in France. I'm looking for interesting faces and characters actors, and it's not for everybody.

All day my mind drifts off into fantasies and little stupid jokes.

There is a new philosophy for weapons: it's more expensive to hurt people than to kill people. It's terrible. When you have a band of guys on the battlefield, if someone is dead, he's dead. If someone is injured then they have to take care of him, so six people are busy.