And so you try your best. Sometimes you go in with one thing, with one desire and come out with something else. In the case of 'The Aviator' it was to create a Hollywood spectacle, but by about the second or third week of shooting you just want to literally survive it. Because don't forget, I also go through the editing process too, and when the film is released I have to talk about it. So, I take all of that very seriously.

We’re face to face with images all the time in a way that we never have been before... Young people need to understand that not all images are there to be consumed like fast food and then forgotten – we need to educate them to understand the difference between moving images that engage their humanity and their intelligence, and moving images that are just selling them something.

It seems to me that any sensible person must see that violence does not change the world and if it does, then only temporarily.

You've got to protect whatever creative talent you have left.

All my life, I never really felt comfortable anywhere in New York, except maybe in an apartment somewhere.

You don't make pictures for Oscars.

If you don’t like the films of Samuel Fuller , then you just don’t like cinema.