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

Film is such an extraordinary rich medium which can handle so many different modes of operation, combining together in the same place all these extraordinary disciplines which may be executed in their own right - music, writing, picture making of all kinds, and I often feel that some filmmakers make films with one eye closed and two hands tied behind their backs.

I always think that if you deal with extremely emotional, even melodramatic, subject matter, as I constantly do, the best way to handle those situations is at a sufficient remove. It's like a doctor and a nurse and a casualty situation. You can't help the patient and you can't help yourself by emoting. And I don't think cinema is intended for therapy, so I object also to that huge, massive manipulation which is perpetrated on the public.

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?

There's more religion in my little finger than there is in the pope. But no, I don't believe in God. I am an athiest. A Darwinian evolutionist.

There are many photos of Eisenstein. I think he was quite vain, and he liked photos of him. Being a virgin at 33 is strange now, but let's not be too high-minded about that.

Eisenstein was a good editor. I was trained as a film editor, and I've no doubt that the editor is key to a film.