You gotta be careful with message movies. People say "What do you want people to take away from it?" I always say its totally individual.

Listening to critics is like letting Muhammad Ali decide which astronaut goes to the moon.

Stripping away artifice - it's the constant standard I aim for in acting, to approximate life. People talk about being bigger than life - but there's nothing bigger than life.

Well, it's like my movie, 'The Apostle.' Some people in the North don't get that movie. They think that, in the South, if you don't shout, you can't play one of those guys.

We're all travelers in this world. From the sweet grass to the packing house. Birth 'til death. We travel between the eternities.

One thing I like about Argentina, they only cook with salt; that's it.

It suits him because way back many years ago when Nikita Mikhalkov, the great Russian director, came, I said, "I want you to meet somebody." So I get Billy Bob from Malvern, Arkansas and Nikita Mikhalkov from Moscow. It's just two big talents meet. We sat for two or three hours and talked. It was great. He's the real deal, this guy.