Life is full of a thousand red herrings, and it takes the history of a civilisation to work out which are the red herrings and which aren't.

I don't believe in the deplorable notion of realism in the cinema: you can over-reach it, and it becomes as false as convention.

I got in trouble with the stern-faced Russians who didn't want me to create a guy who is mortal.

Every historian has a vested interest. "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" was not about the Roman but the British empire. What price the truth?

I am Welsh by birth, English by education, and European by nature.

My second Christian name is John. Good solid bourgeois Christian name, like my first name, Peter, a rock. Minerals. Build on rock, rocks, uranium. Peter and John were two of the twelve apostles - arguable the two most significant. Were my parents hedging their bets?

I don't want to become an ivory tower filmmaker. That sounds peculiar, but I want to be a mainstream filmmaker. I want the largest possible audience that I can find - but, of course, on my terms.