“When we think we have been hurt by someone in the past, we build up defenses to protect ourselves from being hurt in the future. So the fearful past causes a fearful future and the past and future become one.”

Television has brought back murder into the home – where it belongs.

The ideal husband understands every word his wife doesn’t say.

In the documentary the basic material has been created by God, whereas in the fiction film the director is a God; he must create life.

The only way to get rid of my fears is to make films about them.

Seeing a murder on television can help work off one’s antagonisms. And if you haven’t any antagonisms, the commercials will give you some.

Seeing a murder on television can help us unload the feelings of hate themselves. If you do not have feelings of hatred, may be obtained in the advertising interval.

In films murders are always very clean. I show how difficult it is and what a messy thing it is to kill a man.

Our primary function is to create an emotion and our secondary function is to sustain that emotions.

A woman, I always say, should be like a good suspense movie: The more left to the imagination, the more excitement there is. This should be her aim – to create suspense, to let a man discover things about her without her having to tell him.

Drama is life with the dull bits cut out.

There is something more important than logic: imagination.

I am a typed director. If I made Cinderella, the audience would immediately be looking for a body in the coach.

I like stories with lots of psychology.

A lot of movies are about life, mine are like a slice of cake.

Television is like the invention of indoor plumbing. It didn’t change people’s habits. It just kept them inside the house.

Give them pleasure – the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare.

I never yet feared those men who set a place apart in the middle of their cities where they gather to cheat one another and swear oaths which they break.

Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts, perhaps the fear of a loss of power.

The only way to get rid of my fears is to make films about them.

Give them pleasure – the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare.

Fear of sexuality is the new, disease-sponsored register of the universe of fear in which everyone now lives.

There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it.

I fear my enthusiasm flags when real work is demanded of me.

Whenever we’re afraid, it’s because we don’t know enough. If we understood enough, we would never be afraid.