Given the choice of Hollywood or poking steel pins in my eyes, I'd prefer steel pins.

When I was young I used to sit in the cinema thinking wouldn't it be great if you could have a film in which the characters were like real people instead of being like actors.

If I'm ever working on a set and anyone talks about a master shot, I say there is no master shot. Before I even went to film school, I learned about movies by being in a British feature film, where everything was shot master shot, mid-shot, close-up. But I reject the idea of a master shot. You don't shoot everything mechanically; you find imaginative ways that serve the action.

I'm old enough to have friends and contemporaries who have long since retired, and that's their prerogative - enough is enough; it doesn't mean a thing to me. But I haven't got any money, so, you know, I just keep on working.

It creeps up on you and becomes an obsession. It comes out of watching a million movies.

Some of my favorite movies are Hollywood movies. Hollywood is part of the cinematic spectrum. I nurture a healthy love-hate relationship with Hollywood.

There is a great tradition of independent filmmaking in the U.S. that I absolutely respect. There's some wonderful stuff that comes out in this country against all the odds.