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.
When I did 'E.T.,' it sort of solidified the only family I know are these film crews. These gypsies. These filmmakers. That was the solidification and the clicking revelations of 'This is what I want to do with my life and this is where I'm going to survive.'
You're making a movie, not a documentary. If you made a film like the historians would like you to make, you're not going to go and see it. I'd rather see paint dry.
One good thing about acting in film is that it's good therapy.
There are films that I don't like, and then someone will come up to me and say it's their favorite movie. The movies belong to the people. You make them and you put them out. For me, I love the process of making films. For me, my favorite film is always my next one.
To make a documentary is one thing, to make a feature film is quite another.
I love directing because you get to see your film come to life. You get to work with the actors. There's something magical about each piece of it.
The Australian film industry is a small industry, so you have to really be flexible within working in different mediums. A lot of actors work in theater, film, and television, because there's not much opportunity in terms of employment there.
George Lucas was casting about and had heard favourable things about my work in Clockwork Orange and asked me to come in, which of course I did even though no one knew what the film was about!
Every time I hear, Cut. Print, something cold and electrical goes off in my head, because I'm never going to change that film.
I'd forgotten I'd done the anime called Spirited Away, the English version of a Japanese film.
I wanted to go to Rome. I got an offer to do an Italian film and I went.
When I was doing 'The Sopranos,' I liked putting music together with the film; that was my favorite part of it.
I really feel like indie films are where I learn to be a better actor, especially because they always give you a bit more freedom to collaborate.
There's a tremendous intellectual fervor among independent filmmakers, and that has to be cultivated.
I don't think that any Icelandic filmmaker feels like he belongs to Icelandic filmmaking, because nobody really knows what it is.
I love the grandiosity, how sweepingly entertaining films can be. And I think there's a place for films that pry more into the human condition.
Pose? I don't pose. What am I? Paris Hilton or something?
If you cast a film incorrectly, then you're going to be fighting an uphill battle.
I could be the driver - the Uber guy saying, "I used to be in films years ago... ."
I'm more embarrassed about some of the films that I've been in than I am about Playboy. Playboy I'm actually quite proud of.
You know, let a few years go by until I hit my midlife crisis. Then that can be documented on film.
With some films you can sort of slide in, get a haircut and you're in.
I'd love to work in America, some of my favourite films come from America.
I want to be surprised and entertained by a movie, so that's what we're trying to do for the audience. Obviously, we also have to sell the film.
