I am very much interested in fairy tales. I guess that most of the films I like to do have this kind of aspect.

It seems to me that [my films] are talking about very simple and, I hope, universal feelings. And at the same time, even though they are set in a very weird world with elements that are irrational, at the same time, it's very close to an ordinary world. And I like to have this third feeling of mystery.

I try to simplify things for the children. For instance, [I arrange] for them to have almost no dialogue, or to somehow give them very precise indications, because usually they ask for that.

Maybe our Earth is totally alone in the universe.

The film from the beginning is not the real world; it's an imaginary world. And this imaginary world is both inside and outside the normal world.

I had good parents. Nothing terrible happened. But I had the feeling that they kind of protected me from reality somehow.

I think sometimes there are films where I understand what they are about, but there are also some mysterious areas in the film where I haven't got the whole image and I haven't got everything. And then it stays much longer with me, because I have to somehow put myself much more into the film to get it. And so this is what I'm trying to do with my films.