“For example, Jewish directors coming from Germany or Austria and enriching Hollywood. In 15, 20 years, Hollywood became imperialistic. Cinema goes ahead when it is marriaged by other culture. Otherwise, it turns on itself.”

There you have Quentin playing with kung-fu. That’s why the independents are the most interesting.

What happened in the late Fifties, early Sixties in French cinema was a fantastic revolution.

There was a sense of future that was the result of the mixture of politics, cinema, music, the first joints. And the movies were a very important part of that cocktail.

If you mention any ideological thing about shooting Last Tango in Paris, I was thinking I was doing a political film.

You live day by day. You can’t build your life.

English dialogues are always just what you need and nothing more – like something out of Hemingway. In Italian and in French, dialogues are always theatrical, literary. You can do more with it.

The life before ’68 was very different from the life after ’68. Before ’68, our days were full of authoritarian moments. There were authorities everywhere. In fact, the movement of ’68 was young people against their authorities, children against their parents. And that remained.

Pornography is not in the hands of the child who discovers his sexuality by masturbating, but in the heart of the adult who slaps him.

I left the ending ambiguous, because that is the way life is.

I think that what I learned then, I didn’t know I was learning. I just knew that I was very privileged to see somebody who was a writer, a great poet, and very smart-faced. Suddenly Pasolini becomes a director, so he has to invent cinema.

I was in Italy, but completely in love with the nouvelle vague movement, and directors like Godard, Truffaut, Demy. ‘The Dreamers’ was a total homage to cinema and that love for it.

A dolly move is a moral commitment.

To explore technology for me is something that I have to do. Otherwise, I feel completely left in the back… abandoned.

I don’t see my movies. I think it’s healthier and safer to keep a bit of distance. I’m afraid to be disappointed.

I was seduced by the nouvelle vague, because it was really reinventing everything. And the Italian cinema that one would see in the theaters in the late ’50s, early ’60s was Italian comedy, Italian style, which, to me, was like the end of neo-realism.

I like to be in a huis clos, as the French say – in one place. It’s something that in general can create a bit of claustrophobia. But for me, claustrophobia becomes almost immediately claustrophilia. I love it!

Pre-heat the oven? Really? If I was the sort of person who planned ahead

Focus on the moment, not the monsters that may or may not be up ahead.

In science, the best precept is to alter and exchange our ideas as fast as science moves ahead.

Ruminating about the past will get you nowhere. So go ahead and learn from the past whatever you can, and then put it behind you.

Baseball is like a poker game. Nobody wants to quit when he’s losing; nobody wants you to quit when you’re ahead.

The end is in the beginning and lies far ahead.

See I’m not a monster, I’m just ahead of the curve.

Keep moving ahead because action creates momentum, which in turn creates unanticipated opportunities.