As an artist, you are always striving toward an ultimate achievement but never seem to reach it. You shoot a film, and the result could have always been better. You try again, and fail once more. In some ways I find it enjoyable. You never lose sight of your goal. I don’t do my job to make money or to break box office records, I simply try things out. What would happen if I were to achieve perfection at some point? What would I do then?

I did not marry the first girl that I fell in love with, because there was a tremendous religious conflict, at the time. She was an atheist, and I was an agnostic.

You make films whether they're dramas or comedies about neurotic people. Flawed people. Interesting personality traits. To make them about calm, stable untroubled people isn't interesting.

American films, it's a money-making industry. And in France, you can find great respect for cinema as art.

You're a genius! And the proof is that both common people and intellectuals find your work completely incoherent.

I never start editing a film until it's completely shot; I don't edit along the way, ever. When it's finished I come in here [screening room] and we start with reel one, scene one and start editing shot by shot by shot until we're finished.

All literature is a footnote to Faust. I have no idea what I mean by that.