Pastoral Resources

All I wanted with that film was to represent the possibility that there might be normal people who are Muslim or Arab with the same fears, responsibilities, hopes.

I still think of myself as a stage actor. When I do film and television I try to implement what I was taught to do in theatre, to try to stretch into characters that are far from myself.

This is one of the factors that also made me very much want to make this film, apart from the fact that I loved it. If the boy hadn't been Jewish and the man hadn't been Muslim, it wouldn't have made any difference to the film. I don't think it's relevant, really.

This character in the film, these things that he says which sound like advice and wise things, they are very common for Orientals. It's all the tradition.

I don't think any actor feels comfortable watching themselves in movies. You must be very narcissistic. The problem with your own opinion of yourself is that contrary to the normal spectators, when you watch a film you are in, you only watch yourself.

When I did the film Generations, in which the character died, I felt like a guest for the first time. That made me very sad.

I think making a good film shot is joyful.

People who are good at film have a relationship with the camera.

I didn't have a lot of independent film connections. It really took until the digital film revolution came along that I realized that I could do it myself.

Film acting is really the trick of doing moments. You rarely do a take that lasts more than 20 seconds. You really earn your spurs acting onstage. I needed to do that for myself. I would hate to say at the end of everything that I never did a stage play.

It was one of the marvellous feelings of the film, having the music going in your head while doing scenes.

The corsets I wore in The Railway Children are still in my undies drawer, a prized relic of my favourite film.

While making Genevieve, I learned there could be a lot more to a film than just acting in it.

David Lynch and I almost made a movie together in the late '80s. We had lots of dinners and lunches. He's a very cool, hip guy. This film, let's face it, is like an homage to him, I would imagine he'd find it funny.

The biggest challenge was trying to convey the story of the making of a film that isn't finished yet - and which won't be finished until the third film, The Return of the King, reaches our cinemas towards the end of 2003!

Nooooooo... favorite film, that's like asking if you have a favorite kid!

The studio should not have released this film.

What I learned from this movie, 40 Days and 40 Nights: Absitenence can be a very good thing. Especially from box offices where this film is playing.

I have no idea why one of our most original filmmakers would want to spend two years of his life translating someone else's movie from Spanish into English. And it wasn't such a good film in Spanish, either.

Like Godfather, you look at a movie like that, or something that James Gray has directed, a film with minimal or pin lighting as opposed to everything being lit bright and flat, where everything is evident.