I hate the way war is seen as something inherently brutal and ugly. Yes, much of war brings out the worst part of our [people's] nature. But in war, all kinds of noble human traits have been developed, such as discipline, cohesion, pride.

Desire is both imitative (we like what others like) and competitive (we want to take away from others what they have). As children, we wanted to monopolize the attention of a parent, to draw it away from other siblings. This sense of rivalry... makes people compete for the attention.

The worst thing is to sit and whine and complain and obsess about money as if that were the only sign of your worth as a human.

Along the way, a lot of filmmakers get rid of things that are messy or don't fit in some ways. To me, I want to work with serendipity and things we happened upon. That's our job, that's what the form demands.

I also make movies that can be seen on a small screen, as I shoot on digital video. Hopefully they can be seen small and can live like that.

I'll probably take the prize for the most irrelevant degree. Although some of the things now where they study, you know: "post feministic colonial film theory" - those kind of majors, yeah, that's probably worse. But I was, you know, classics, Greek and Latin, like what's more irrelevant than dead languages, you know?

You must always be prepared to place a bet on yourself, on your future, by heading in a direction that others seem to fear.