I like to make mechanical stuff. Once I make a film I have to do whatever I can make onstage I make it onstage.

I wrote the plot [for the Persepolis ]and Vincent [Paronnaud] and I wrote and discussed the shooting of the script. Vincent then took care of the production design, the actual shooting, and what was going on within each scene. It's very difficult, though, to draw a line between who did what. Because Vincent would say something, and I would add something, and at the end you have this film, yet no clear idea of who did what.

I don't consider myself as a feminist but more a humanist.

I don't think of myself as a rebel; I just say what I think.

Cinema is a world of imagination.

The most exciting time is when I think of an idea and how I imagine I can make it. It would be wonderful if there was a projector inside my eye that and it could just put the idea on the screen for people to see.

I don't make a career plan. I take things the way they come.