Schools and libraries are the twin cornerstones of a civilized society. Libraries are only good if people use them, like books only exist when someone reads them.

I think that the reason that people are so up in arms about movies that have historical inaccuracies is because now that we've trashed our education institutions beyond repair, people fear that the only people are getting their histories is through the movies, so the elephant in the room is that no one wants to talk about why we're so passionately obsessed with accuracy.

So the Lincoln movie gets trashed because Connecticut voted for the amendment - not to mention how the people in Connecticut feel - but there's a lot of that. And I think it precedes from a fundamental misunderstanding of cinema. They are entertainment. And I'd like to say that entertainment isn't a synonym for disposable or mindless or stupid. Hamlet? Pretty entertaining from where I come from.

My father's book is about is about a number of things, but about Houdini's rage to not be a failure like his father, and it's also about converting X-rated material, namely bondage, into family friendly safe fare, which is what he did. It's also about death and resurrection, and rising to live again another day when everyone thinks you're dead.

What I want any genre to do, what I want any work of art to do, is to illuminate the human condition.

Actors will change their face, will change their hair, will change their voice, will disappear into the role. A movie star doesn't disappear.

I was always a filmmaker before I was anything else. If I was always anything, I was a storyteller, and it never really made much of a difference to me what medium I worked in.