I have one life. I am a certain age. I'm married to one person. I have a certain number of children. I won't have another life other than that, but I do have many lives through the films.

Every single art form is involved in film, in a way.

Once I start to do a film, it has inferences. If a guy walks down a street and kicks a dog, you're saying something about that guy. A guy walks down the street and somebody's about to be run over and he shoves him out of his way and gets hit by the car himself, you're saying that guy's a hero. You can't avoid making certain statements.

Making films is much more difficult than people imagine, and so the experience of actually directing them is not one I've ever relished.

OK, I know this is going to disgust you, Michael, but a lot of people are in this business to make money.

Making a film is a way for me to understand what it's like to be a murderer, to confess, to be a beaten wife, to be a minority, to be a victor, to get the girl, to lose the girl. I can do all of that through the practice of an art form.

I have to have a working knowledge of light, and optics, film emulsions and their properties, and lenses, otherwise I can't create the shoots that are the vocabulary of the films. But it is not necessary for me to be a cameraman, I can hire a cameraman.