“Ive never actually watched another director work.”

I’ve had some fantastically good people help me make the movies.

It doesn’t matter what the technology is – no one will watch a Peter Greenaway film anyway.

Well, if you ask any filmmaker how they got into it, everyone came a different route.

So fine that the Irish don’t even acknowledge that it exists.

If you’d been where I’d been… if you’d seen the things I’d seen!… you… you’d be me… Or someone following me around.

Have a go. Anybody can do it.

I was once described by one of my critics as an aesthetic fascist.

I’m a pluralist. I’ve always argued that as many different films as possible should be made.

Rain is also very difficult to film, particularly in Ireland because it’s quite fine.

A Great Movie Evolves when Everybody Has the Same Vision in Their Heads.

The films that I do tend to polarise people’s views.

I’ve always been completely autocratic. I’ve never learned to be diplomatic or democratic.

Personally I am very much against the death penalty for several reasons.

Most directors have little lists in their heads of people they really want to work with.

Film-making is a physically hard job.

I always argued against the auteur theory; films are a collaborative art form.

Data can actually make us more human.

I know when it comes to the actual narrative of my solo music, it’s its own thing. That’s why I went out of my way after ‘Crew’ to not do a bunch of collaborations.

I was bored one day, so my dad took me to this acting school. I liked it more than having fun – I liked it for an actual job.

I’m actually listening and being obedient, life is so much better.

Silence, I discover, is something you can actually hear.

Sometimes we have to do the work even though we don’t yet see a glimmer on the horizon that it’s actually going to be possible.

The virtuous man contents himself with dreaming that which the wicked man does in actual life.

Never pretend to a love which you do not actually feel, for love is not ours to command.