Jake Green isn't just Jake Green. Jake represents all of us. The colour green is the central column of the spectrum and the name Jake has all sorts of numerical values. All things come back to him within the film's world of cons and games.

I'm not politically motivated. I used to be - passionately. I used to be very Left wing. Then I went very Right wing, and now I rest somewhere in the middle.

I love fatherhood. I could bang on about kids forever.

I think there's a natural system in your own head about how much violence the scene warrants. It's not an intellectual process, it's an instinctive process.

In fact, 95% of the people in my films have been nothing less than a pleasure to work with.

I like to think that we've got a plan, so let's stick to it. That said, once we've stuck to it, we're allowed as much improvisation as anyone cares to indulge themselves in.

It's not easy to strap yourself down to a desk and bash on a keyboard when you know you can direct lots of films, because directing films is fun and interactive and gregarious. Writing isn't.

I suppose directing on set is the most fun because it's a good crack and you feel you're on the battlefield whereas writing is a fairly solitary undertaking.

We're quite volatile as individuals, but that doesn't work exponentially when we are together. Relationships are about eating humble pie.

The English countryside is the most staggeringly beautiful place. I can't spend as much time there as I like, but I like everything about it. I like fishing, I like clay- pigeon shooting.

All the other guys I think had a scream on Lock, Stock. They just had a laugh and a crack, and thought it would never come out; they were just having a good time. On this one, I felt that.

They're all based on factual characters. Well, a good amount of them. That's why I was attracted to this genre anyways, because these characters are so large and cartoonish, they're like caricatures, I just felt that there had to be a film made about them.

After Lock, Stock, all these really nasty small town characters came knocking at my door trying to tell me stories, and somehow I ended up with this guy whose brother was feeding people to pigs, and that's what he did to get rid of people.

You get a different kick out of all aspects of filmmaking.

The best thing to do is find one person in your life and try to love them unconditionally. If you've accomplished that, you've accomplished a lot.

What I liked about American movies when I was a kid was that they're sort of larger than life and I think I'm still suffering from that reaction.

Other than the fact that I like a country house, I can't think of anything I'd want to spend my money on.

We can all be conned but at what point do we realize that we're being conned and to what point do we allow ourselves to be conned?

We are not that flash, me or the missus. In fact, we are quite low-maintenance.

It's about not letting the internal enemy, the real enemy, have his way because the more he does the stronger he becomes. The film's about the devastating results that can manifest from the internal enemy being unbridled and allowed to unleash chaos.

On Lock, Stock, we didn't know where the money for shooting the next day was coming from.

Yeah, I'm certainly a lot more confident on this one than I was one the last one, which I think can be a good thing and a bad thing. But, at least I slept while making this film.

I'm not under too much of an illusion of how smart or un-smart I am because filmmaking ultimately is about teamwork.

The idea is that that there is no such thing as an external enemy.

My principal job is to make interesting and entertaining films, and I'm not proud of which format or which particular technique I use. I just wanted the film to look good.

I can understand that the whole world is interested in my wife Madonna. That's even why I married her.

I got into film-making because I was interested in making entertaining movies, which I felt there was a lack of.

We always have a take that's 'one for fun', so once you've got what you need, you can do what you like. Something does occasionally pop out of that tree. I'm always open to ideas.

I got too fed up with films that didn't make you think. I liked the idea of one that you'd have to be dancing around with. I like my mind to be engaged when I watch a film.

Well, what I try to do is throw as much mud on the wall as I possibly can and just see what sticks, what shines as quirky or more interesting that the others, and I try to cling onto that one, somehow join a link from there to there.

I'd like to work with the missus, but there's nothing in the pipeline at the moment.

I like death. I'm a big fan of it.

Previously, on Lock, Stock, I went to bed at two in the morning and woke up at five in the morning, and on this one I was known to nod off on the set occasionally.

If somebody has a better idea than me, I'll take it if it surpasses what we have on the page because at the end of the day, it's me that takes the credit anyway!

Jake Green isn't just Jake Green. Jake represents all of us. The colour green is the central column of the spectrum and the name Jake has all sorts of numerical values. All things come back to him within the film's world of cons and games.

I am not involved in any 'issues' because it's too sensitive for me - or my wife - to get involved. Every time we express an opinion it becomes a whole thing in itself. And the whole purpose of living in the countryside was to get away from hundreds of people. My wife fell off a horse, and suddenly there are hundreds of people around.

Sugar is responsible for a lot of deaths. Arguably more than crack cocaine.

My best film composing experience was with Elia Kazan.

I was lucky enough to occasionally break out of that racist situation that prevails in the Hollywood film production community. But it was racist then and it will always be that way. It will never be otherwise.

'Batman' took 10 months to film, and by the time I stopped working on it, it took a long time before my English accent came out again. I was actually having to try for it.

Luck is everything... My good luck in life was to be a really frightened person. I'm fortunate to be a coward, to have a low threshold of fear, because a hero couldn't make a good suspense film.

I still feel that a movie has to attempt to say something - even if it fails miserably. But I've sort of given up on believing that I'm going to change the world with every film I choose to act in.

It's the difficulty we had with Mr. Bean, actually, when it went from TV to film. You certainly discover that you need to explain more about a character.

To make a documentary is one thing, to make a feature film is quite another.

I mean when the play was on in New York I was starting to get film offers coming through, and since the film's come out I get offered more than I used to, but it happens incrementally.

I think it would be very boring dramatically to have a film where everybody was a lawyer or doctor and had no faults. To me, the most important thing is to be truthful.

I like doing them and they're ridiculous and the actors can improvise a lot, and they don't have to be really realistic characters that hit a very specific tone as in a feature film. They're really fun, I want to make more of them definitely.

One of the most interesting aspects of the film project was collaborating with so many people - directors, filmmakers, and writers - over a five-year period. I learned that there are two components to this.

The best thing I can think of would be to create a union between something as beautiful and powerful and wonderful as Hollywood films and a criticism of the status quo. That's my dream, to make such a German film.