I think most films are too predictable. They follow familiar patterns. I suppose audiences like to know where they stand but I like films that take me by surprise, take unexpected turns and twists.

And you poor creatures--who conjured you out of the clay? Is God in show business, too?

All art is fundamentally subversive, because it upsets people's perceptions, their notions about society. Therefore, art is dangerous, but good art is always making us reassess our thoughts and feelings about how we relate to other people. There are always people who fear that and want to suppress that.

All the interesting films are now being made by their subsidiaries for very low budgets. But the studios are not making money. They're making these big, very expensive pictures that take a lot of money but don't really pay for their costs. So they're having a very difficult time. I can see the system breaking down. I think the American studios are a reflection or a metaphor for American industry altogether, which is failing in the world. Its economic domination is being broken down and I think the same thing is happening to the studios.

I think most films are too predictable. They follow familiar patterns. I suppose audiences like to know where they stand but I like films that take me by surprise, take unexpected turns and twists.

Black-and-white gives you that sort of parallel world. Also, it's very close to the condition of dreaming, to the unconscious.

There are always forces at work in a society, certainly in America, which are really forces of censorship -either religious bodies or zealots who are always putting pressure on things, whether it's books or art or film. And all art is fundamentally subversive, because it upsets people's perceptions, their notions about society. Therefore, art is dangerous, but good art is always making us reassess our thoughts and feelings about how we relate to other people. There are always people who fear that and want to suppress that.