What would an ocean be without a monster lurking in the dark? It would be like sleep without dreams.

Netflix knew I was going to North Korea and Ethiopia and Iceland. They saw the film and liked it and that was that.

THE ACT OF KILLING invents a new form of cinematic surrealism.

Ten years ago in Antarctica shooting "Encounters at the End of the World," I met a very fine volcanologist from Cambridge University [Clive Oppenheimer] and we kept talking about doing a film and all of a sudden it became serious when he hinted at the possibility to film in North Korea.

I never planned my career in steps. It's all coming at me like burglars in the night.

When you look at the paintings at Chauvet Cave, they're not primitive or like children's little scribbles, it bursts on the scene fully accomplished and when you look through the faces of cultural history, art history, it has never gotten any better.

At the same time, there's something magnificent about volcanoes; they created the atmosphere that we need for breathing.