From my films, you can at least learn about Iran, you can get a sense of the history and the society. But no such films have been made about Afghanistan, so you really can't know much about it.
There are so many different reasons as to why I love riding trains. But I think ultimately it's the romantic feeling of it. There's something about it that just transports me into old films.
For horror movies, color is reassuring because, at least in older films, it adds to the fakey-ness.
I realized that everyone in Western society, in some weird way, believes that they've had the experience of producing feature films.
In real life, we're not walking around waiting for something to happen. We live our lives, and then suddenly we fall in love with somebody, and it's a big mess because you have a wife already, and it's going to destroy your life. And, at the same time, it's beautiful. Often, in films, it's not like that.
I'm either going to have the career I want doing films, or I'll do something else - I'll be gone.
I enjoy making films and some experiences are better than others. Most of the time they're great experiences. . . but turning up to go to work on this every day was an absolute pleasure and that comes from the top.
After watching films of Jim Brown, I noticed that he never ran out of bounds. He always ran North and South and that's what I turned my style into. I was a North and South runner.
The Iranian government as a whole has no relationship with my films. They're not particularly interested, perhaps this kind of cinema is not very interesting to them.
I had to work out where I was going, what type of films I wanted to make. For that reason, I decided to choose independent productions, less important roles, and I tried theater, too.
It's hard to be reverent today when directors make films that are not as good. There will be time later, though, when their lesser films are forgotten and just focus on the greatness.
When I was a kid, I thought movie stars were women and men who were in these great films that we still look at now. But I don't think there are too many films coming out these days that we're going to look at in the future and say, "This is one of the great ones. "
From the outset, I conceived Star Wars as a series of six films, or two trilogies.
The films that I love are very straightforward stories, like really old-fashioned stuff.
I realized that Owen [Suskind] is completely brilliant, because he embraced and memorized all these classic Disney films - these fables that chronicle the hero's journey, and have existed for thousands of years. Owen, in a sense, grew up on a diet of myth and fable, and has become an expert on their themes, which contain a moral guide that connects people.
I guess I probably make violent films partly because I can't express my anger in my real life very well.
My films, no one else will do.
If I can still be successful making films and no-one will ever know me, then that would be great. Because we (actors) just like to do what we do. People who are doing it for fame, I don't know if they ever get really successful.
I would never want to do something just for the sake of being independent or for the sake of doing big films. I'm always surprised by the material I'm attracted to. And that's how I like it. I like to be surprised.
I think Little Nicky was a divergence from the films Adam Sandler was used to doing, and he was taking a risk. I admire him for doing that.