I remember the first film I reviewed for the Daily was a John Ford Western. I think it was My Darling Clementine, but I am not certain. And I was just impressed by, first, the story itself. I didn't know that much about films. But the acting, the director. And particularly, the cinematography, the black-and-white use of exteriors, I noted particularly.

There are eleven or twelve or thirteen cities in China with populations of over 10 million people and most people in the West have never even heard of these cities.

A great director, first, is highly intelligent. And he is also a dedicated and willing to work hard. Now those are easy things to identify. The third is the creativity, and that is very difficult to identify in advance. This is why so many of the directors who have started with me were my assistant - the first one was Francis Ford Coppola.

I look for the ability to work. Directing is hard work. They don't teach you that in film school. Critics are not aware of it, but it is hard, physical work.

There's always something that draws you away from the original script.

People gravitate occasionally to the brilliantly made art low budget films, which is maybe one out of every five hundred low budget films made.

Motion pictures are the art form of the 20th century, and one of the reasons is the fact that films are a slightly corrupted artform. They fit this century - they combine Art and business!