I think my films are very English. That certain emotional distance, interest in the world, interest in irony. These are all deeply English propositions.

I certainly don't believe you documentary filmmakers. Like me, you are involved in making fiction, and your fiction is just as well organized and just as well predicated, but the big difference between me and you is that I'm honest and you're dishonest. I know I'm telling you lies.

American actors are coy. We all have pricks and cunts, or are you different from the rest of us?

Cinema basically examines a personality first and the body afterward.

My heroes among filmmakers would be people like Buñuel and Pasolini, who were of very high cinematic intelligence, but tread on a lot of toes.

Painting is the supreme form of expression; you don't need to 'read' painting.

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.