It's easy to attack an artist as misogynist, but that's really such a facile epithet. And if an artist is constantly worrying about how others will judge a work, it can end up being a block to investigating certain areas of human nature or certain truths about sexuality.

You have to be polite with your friends and your family, but in your art, it's important to not be polite.

A good film is always nourishing. It's not about it being hopeful or bleak; it's about how it touches you, how it moves or stirs you.

I think it's really important as an artist not to be drawn to the haters, because there are so many people who are nice and quiet.

I think it's important to make art that is not that easily absorbable, that is a challenge to the authorities.

I spent a lot of time at the New York Public Library, the main branch. I was one of those people. If you ever spend a good amount of time there, you realize there are people who spend the entire day there. They're bookish homeless people.

You always feel very vulnerable when you put your work out there. You feel a kind of nakedness. And you expose something of the inner workings of the way you experience life.