I suppose I have a highly developed capacity for self-delusion, so it's no problem for me to believe that I'm somebody else.

I hate wasting people's time.

If people take an interest in you and they think there's half a chance, they might hang on. It's dreadful.

I made the film in spite of Harvey, not because of Harvey.

I suppose I have a highly developed capacity for self-delusion, so it's no problem for me to believe that I'm somebody else.

When I've gone back to work, it's always with that sense of inevitability. That may be a complete delusion, but it's the one that I need to get out of bed and go about my business. That sense that I can't avoid this thing. I better just get on with it.

My curiosity sustains me for the period of the shoot.

There must've been some part of me that wanted to make my mark. But there was never a defining moment.

Many years ago, I really didn't know where the next work was coming from.

At a certain age it just became apparent to me that this was probably the work that I would have to do.

I was a savage for so many years of my life. There was some seed of determination in me that I was not conscious of. I was mostly consciously getting into trouble and drunk.

The whole thing of weight, I guess it's because there is a wider fascination we all have with weight.

Everybody has to know for themselves what they're capable of.

I think some actors thrive on working at a much greater pace than I do.

I feel less often compelled to do the work than I was in the past.

I find it easier to work when it's quiet.

The last time I was on a small set would've been probably My Left Foot.

I think I have a strange relationship with time. I'm not really aware of that time passing. I don't feel that I'm wasteful with time. But I'm not aware of it passing.

I see a lot of movies. I love films as a spectator, and that's never obscured by the part of me that does the work myself. I just love going to the movies.

Making a film, setting it up and getting it cast and getting it together, is not an easy thing.

There's nothing worse than finding yourself in a situation, a very demanding piece of work, and knowing that you're not a true ally to the person who's in charge of all that.

You can never fully put your finger on the reason why you're suddenly, inexplicably compelled to explore one life as opposed to another.

Being at the centre of a film is a burden one takes on with innocence the first time. Thereafter, you take it on with trepidation.

I don't know what impression you might have of the way I live. I live in a quiet place. I do not live as a hermit, though other people would prefer it if I did.

How people are around a director, it really does affect everything, every detail of the life of the movie.

I'm very often still very much alive for that other being and that other world long after the film is finished.

I suppose the place where I live is fairly remote, it would seem remote to some people.

I would wish for any one of my colleagues to have the experience of working with Martin Scorsese once in their lifetime.

The painter... does not fit the paints to the world. He most certainly does not fit the world to himself. He fits himself to the paint. The self is the servant who bears the paintbox and its inherited contents.

Love is a mutual self-giving which ends in self-recovery.

I would rather take the role and work and make my own money and self respect than to have sex with someone who has a lot of money.

Lying is the most simple form of self-defence.

Sexual self-restraint is only a preliminary stage in the ego's evolution.

The intelligence of the lower forms of animal life, like a great deal of human intelligence, does not involve a self.

If you improve a teacher's self-esteem, confidence, communication skills or stress levels, you improve that teacher's overall effectiveness across the curriculum.

To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves - there lies the great, singular power of self-respect.

I think we all have blocks between us and the best version of ourselves, whether it's shyness, insecurity, anxiety, whether it's a physical block, and the story of a person overcoming that block to their best self. It's truly inspiring because I think all of us are engaged in that every day.

Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another.

Can anything be so elegant as to have few wants, and to serve them one's self?

Self-justification is a treacherous servant.

To be able to throw one's self away for the sake of a moment, to be able to sacrifice years for a woman's smile - that is happiness.

Oh, God, I struggle with low self-esteem all the time! I think everyone does. I have so much wrong with me, it's unbelievable!

Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.

The best executive is one who has sense enough to pick good people to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.

No doubt Western civilization has in the past been full of wars and revolutions, and the national elements in our culture, even when they were ignored, always provided an unconscious driving force of passion and aggressive self-assertion.

Housework is work directly opposed to the possibility of human self-actualization.

Having a sense of purpose is having a sense of self. A course to plot is a destination to hope for.

But I tend to think of the expressive part of me as rather tedious - never curious or responsive, but blind and self-serving.

And partly, the worst thing you could do in my family was need something from someone. So physical strength represented an avenue of self-sufficiency to me.