Paul Verhoeven

“People love seeing violence and horrible things. The human being is bad and he can't stand more than five minutes of happiness. Put him in a dark theater and ask him to look at two hours of happiness and he'd walk out or fall asleep.”

Michel Brault

Raúl Ruiz

“If you can make it complicated, why make it simple?”

François Ozon

“I think cinema has to deal with desire. In the cinema, you are with a big screen, it is dark, and you watch some images, like a fantasy, so I think it is important for you to feel desire for what you see.”

Ti West

“The independent world and the studio world are very different. The independent world is about, "Let's get this movie made because it's going to be awesome and we believe in it," and the studio world is about slow business decisions.”

Adam Wingard

Andrzej Żuławski

“To please the majority is the requirement of the Planet Cinema. As far as I’m concerned, I don’t make a concession to viewers, these victims of life, who think that a film is made only for their enjoyment, and who know nothing about their own existence.”

Lina Wertmüller

“I am passionate about liberty. I'm by nature an anarchist, an individualist.”

Andrew Bujalski

“When you have to live with something for so many years, the film becomes indistinguishable from what you think of as your life. I’m sure there’s a danger to that. But there are also great things that can come from that.”

Gregg Araki

“I couldn’t make movies like this if I started to worry about what Jerry Falwell is going to have to say about it.”

Joe Swanberg

“I realized that because I'd been producing so much work, I hadn't changed enough as a person between projects. At that point I couldn't make another movie even if I'd wanted to, because I hadn't had a life for so long.”

Bradley Rust Gray

Radu Muntean

“I only really want to be able to make the movies I wish to make, to function in a normal film industry and to have a producer who gives me enough creative freedom. Right now I want to make very simple movies, subtle, dry, strong and with interesting stories.”

Jean-Jacques Beineix

“[on releasing the director's cut of Betty Blue] Very simple: More sex, more violence, and more money for me.”

Na Hong-jin

James Williamson

Peter Tscherkassky

“I refer to my work as being cinematographic poetry and that’s why I love that layering, those superimpositions, right from the beginning of my filmic work.”

Martin McDonagh

“I can't stand up in front of people. It just fills me with horror.”

Mario Bava

“In a horror film, lighting is 70% of the effectiveness. It’s essential in creation the atmosphere.”

Bertrand Bonello

“Mythology was the result of a polytheist society, today the oracle of my film who tells people their future clashes with Church dogma.”