I like the possibility of failure. I don't want to be in a comfortable zone.

Look, I'm no purist - there are good superhero films, and there are bad ones.

Always when you are doing films, the themes swallow you in one way or another.

I started off writing TV adverts. I saw those as rehearsals for a feature film.

I've learned to lose with a smile on my face. That's what the Oscar teaches you.

I'm neurotic. I complain all the time. I'm a workaholic. And I'm never satisfied.

I like to make films, but the only reason I do is because I'm a very bad musician.

'Russian Ark,' I adore - I almost cried at the end of that film, it's so beautiful.

In my work I think what drives me is perfection. I'm a chronically unsatisfied guy.

I didn't have a normal academic career. I never studied cinema. I learned from life.

If you stretch tragedy, it will always become comedy. That's the comedy that I like.

When you have critics filing on Twitter, it leaves no time for thought and perspective.

That incredible bubble and high expectations built at festivals can work against a film.

I have to have the wheel. It's given me an opportunity to experience and explore things.

While 'Babel' is a foreign-language film in some countries, in others, it is a local film.

I think that people would like to, at all times, reject death and disease with technology.

I think every beautiful tale in the world hides the truth and reveals it little by little.

Filmmaking can give you everything, but at the same time, it can take everything from you.

To make a film is easy; to make a good film is war. To make a very good film is a miracle.

There was so much fear after 9/11, and that fear caused people to make the wrong decisions.

Films like 'Babel' can transcend the one point-of-view formula that has reigned for so long.

'Amores Perros' is three stories that interconnect in one moment, which is the car accident.

Really, I'm a neurotic perfectionist. Every single word in the script is the one that I want.

'Amores Perros' is rock, '21 Grams' is jazz, 'Babel' is an opera, and 'Biutiful' is a requiem.

I can't imagine David Lean justifying why he went to the desert to shoot 'Lawrence of Arabia.'

Movies started out as an extension of a magic trick, so making a spectacle is part of the game.

As a city, it is always compelling. But every day in Mexico City, I give thanks that I am alive.

We try to show that violence has a consequence - when you create violence, it turns against you.

The visual architecture of 'Biutiful' is the most sophisticated of all the films I have directed.

Now that we're poisoned with the culture of superheroes, I think it's important to laugh about it.

Good directors don't answer questions with their work. They generate debate and create discussion.

'Birdman' came from a very beautiful side of me, from a part of honesty and surrender about things.

I think we do good things and bad things, sometimes simultaneously - or they may be the same thing.

I hate superficial violence. It's shallow and stupid, and the impact on the audience is really bad.

It's more enjoyable for me to know that life is finite. Knowing that, I would like to go to a party.

My duty is to make probable the improbable. If I tell you how I did it, I will ruin your experience.

In 'A Confession,' Tolstoy found meaning that he could hold on to, and he lived for another 30 years.

I personally think that you have to get lost to find something really worthwhile, at least sometimes.

As the camera, I try to subordinate every word to be truthful and honest to each character's context.

All my films have always been released in the autumn, maybe because they're more melancholy to people.

I always have considered Michael Keaton to be a phenomenal actor because he navigates drama and comedy.

I have been very lucky to have final cut in all my films; everything that is wrong in them is my fault.

Millions of Mexicans leave their kids in order to take care of other kids. That's a very painful thing.

To question your own process is a necessity. If you don't question yourself, it's impossible to improve.

When I have been exposed to so many films that are so bad, my soul gets crushed. I just feel intoxicated.

I'm less interested in reality. I'm more interested in perception, the truth of the universe that we see.

The creative process is mysterious; a conversation, a ride in the car, or a melody can trigger something.

I saw what I could [in Mexico City], but we rarely got anything other than big, mainstream American films.

You can better embrace life, you can enjoy it more, when you are conscious that it will end. You bite life.

I think Jenny Beavan is a masterful costume designer and very deserving of the Oscar for 'Mad Max: Fury Road.'

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