Women had enormous weight in America. And they still have. Because they are truly the padrone [owners, masters] of America.

I don't want to do a war film per se. Nor do I want to do a political film.

America is so varied and exciting that after six months, you go back and find it completely changed.

The important thing is to make a different world, to make a world that is not now. A real world, a genuine world, but one that allows myth to live. The myth is everything.

I can't see America any other way than with a European's eyes. It fascinates me and terrifies me at the same time.

I am searching as Diogenes did with his lantern for all of these wonderful human beings. I haven't found them yet.

I've always believed that true cinema is cinema of the imagination.