“What is the survival strategy of a community in a state of perpetual catastrophe?...And when does making fun—the assumed irresponsibility, the dark humor that we, Romanians, are so proud of—stop being an impenetrable shield? This is the number one matter in all my movies.”
“Any interference by society in an adult’s personal life will be extremely dangerous until society itself becomes ideal. But in the ideal society interference in personal life will obviously be unnecessary.”
“It isn't easy to accept that suffering can also be beautiful...it's difficult. It's something you can only understand if you dig deeply into yourself.”
“Juxtaposing a person with an environment that is boundless, collating him with a countless number of people passing by close to him and far away, relating a person to the whole world, that is the meaning of cinema.”