We [people] are a species that's wired to tell stories. We need stories. It's how we make sense of things. It's how we learn.

People are sort of numb to watching violence, but sexual activity is still as strong as it ever was in terms of generating response.

Maybe I'll paint, do photography, just something else. I can see that.

I was thinking that people have to believe you're crazy in order to take you seriously as an artist. If you're wandering the streets, talking in gibberish, nobody ever asks you to change anything about your art because there's no context for people to look at what you do.

The best set was probably 'Bloody Sunday.' We had no money for extras and gambled on months of outreach to persuade the people of Derry to turn out and march for us on one single afternoon. And they did. In their tens of thousands. Seeing them march, their patience and their dignity and their commitment, I knew the movie would have a quality of truth.

I think there are only two times that I've ever ended up paying somebody their quote. Like what they actually were worth in the marketplace.

[I watch] Fincher, Spielberg, Cameron, McTiernan. Just people who are good at staging action. I like to know where I am. I don't like the kind of cutting where you don't know where you are.