I don't know what the character is going to be. We sit down and we create a character, and all of the characters in all of my films are made like that.

It's an unhealthy habit to say that life is what you make of it, and if you want to be happy, then you can be happy. That's just rubbish, basically. Life is about luck and it's about circumstances and socioeconomic conditions and all the rest of it, but you know, you can also make choices. It's about spirit and generosity and all the other things, too.

I feel very much ideologically, politically if you like, and emotionally part of the European cinema.

The main problem is that the Hollywood system has already made the film before the director shoots a single frame.

I discover what my film is by embarking on the journey of making it.

He's [Constable] a great painter as far as it goes, but I don't think he's remotely interesting. Not really. It's very pretty and it's very thorough, but it's not evocative, it's not dramatic, it doesn't do what Beethoven does - it doesn't shake you down to the roots of your soul, which Turner does. Constable is just very nice, basically. And moving on to personality, Constable was a very dull character.

I have to get out of bed every day to make something happen.