Film has become a marketed commodity, and the opportunities and audiences for art cinema have grown smaller. There is a general downturn in cultural literacy, perhaps because of television.

I find that when I am actually writing, I enter a zone of concentration too small to admit my troubles.

Movies are like a machine that generates empathy.

And I think both the left and the right should celebrate people who have different opinions, and disagree with them, and argue with them, and differ with them, but don't just try to shut them up.

Dice Rules is one of the most appalling movies I have ever seen. It could not be more damaging to the career of Andrew Dice Clay if it had been made as a documentary by someone who hated him. The fact that Clay apparently thinks this movie is worth seeing is revealing and sad, indicating that he not only lacks a sense of humor, but also ordinary human decency.

In the world of bad movies, 'Death to Smoochy' is a towering achievement.

You can't just tell actors, especially young ones, to 'act happy' and expect them to do it. They must in some essential way be happy.