I believe that when people try to live their life at the fullest, there's a certain laughter that comes out of it. The more they try to live their life seriously, the funnier it is. It happens all the time in our real life.

It's not really important to make skillful movies. I think expressing yourself really well, skill-wise, is not as important. I want it to be sort of raw and rough but new and fun to watch.

In Japan, violence isn't as controversial as it is in the West. Pornography is more restricted, but it's not hard to make a crazy, extremely violent film.

I'm happy that my films were discovered by chance by foreign film festivals. That makes me realise more that there is a world outside Japan too. For me, it's an occasion to meet many people and to experience directly the response of international audiences to my films. But for me as a director, my attitude towards making films hasn't changed with the fame. I feel it's not good to change as a person anyway

When you try to be true to the script, changes occur. A script is there to show us a certain direction. But when you actually have the actors in and you start shooting the movie, you have the actor say a line and it doesn't sound right so you change it and make it different. It's the script that gives birth to these changes and the more you try to stay true to the script, the more that happens.

You can't really make something or make a movie and feel all through the process that it's a painful thing. It's not possible to do that.

At some moments, you feel attracted to someone of the same sex, even if it's not sexual. You just want to be like him.