I've got a lot of examples about moments where I thought something would work on film and it didn't work, but I never came to that decision with the film half shot, where I was stuck on a runaway train and couldn't jump off. On those occasions where I have admitted defeat, that this is not going to work, I haven't embarked on that project and made that movie.

Documentaries are the first line of education, and the second line of education is dramatization, such as 'The Pacific'.

I usually do about five cuts as a director. I haven't ever directed a film where I haven't made five passes through the movie, and that takes a long time.

The machinery of the democratic process is really no different today from what it was 150 years ago.

People have forgotten how to tell a story. Stories don't have a middle or an end any more. They usually have a beginning that never stops beginning.

I don't play online games. 'Warcraft,' I've played that, but I mainly play action games.

It's funny, you make friends and you lose friends when you're making a movie.