I've never had a method of working. I change according to circumstances; I don't employ any particular technique or style. I make films instinctively, more with my belly than with my brain.

A particular type of film emerged from World War Two, with the Italian neorealist school. It was perfectly right for its time, which was as exceptional as the reality around us. Our major interest focused on that and on how we could relate to it. Later, when the situation normalized and post-war life returned to what it had been in peacetime, it became important to see the intimate, interior consequences of all that had happened.

There's much talk about the problems of youth, but young people are not a problem. It's a natural evolution of things. We, who have known only how to make war and slaughter people, have no right to judge them, nor can we teach them anything.

When you work on a character, you form in your mind an image of what he ought to look like. Then you go and find one who resembles him.

Do you really think a man must be strong, masculine, dominating, and the woman frail, obedient and sensitive? This is a conventional idea. Reality is quite different.

In any case, the idea of giving "all" of reality is overly simple and absurd.

I've made films about the middle classes because I know them best. Everyone talks about what he knows best.