But the process of making a film is not glamorous. Certainly not my films.

I really believe you can predict when someone has a great attitude, a real well of talent.

I feel very comfortable shooting music, and I think you can see that.

The SAS is the most elite of the special forces in the world. They are not people who go out and advertise; they keep it inside. They don't want anybody to know about them.

You'd be surprised how many movie stars still care about the work.

It's very clearly stated in the film: You make your own choices, and what you're always fighting is ego.

I make films about working class people.

But, unfortunately, sometimes that affirmation creates a sense that you deserve special treatment and recognition in areas where you're not so talented.

It isn't glamorous until after the film is finished, and you are at the premiere and getting your picture on the cover of magazines.

I also know what looks good before the camera, how to move the camera, and how to get a story on the screen.

We all get paid very, very well, and we have responsibilities.

If people are worried about the size of their trailers, I kind of say their priorities are off.

I try to get the best performance an actor can give.

An actor has to embody a role.

This devil loves mankind because men are going to always make the choice that will send him into ascendancy. He's been winning the game for a long time.

Ray Charles, in his own way, it's like at the beginning, Ray Charles changed American music, not once but twice.

And it's a question of how far we're willing to go in order to let the ego shine, in order to let that beacon penetrate not only the local scene but the world.

But a writer's contribution is literary and a film is not literary. When you take that stuff off the page, and cast the people who are going to fit into those roles, that's what being a director is.

It's much easier to work with an unknown.

Russell Crowe is very difficult, but it's worth it. He's the real thing. I can tell you this. Russell Crowe was just as difficult before he was an international star as he was afterwards.

Well I don't think I've scored my life exclusively to Ray Charles.

The whole concept of the devil is a metaphor on one level.

It was the era of Tab Hunter and Rock Hudson; they all had a certain look.

Look at Walter Huston in The Devil and Daniel Webster: It's an incredible performance.

Show business is one of those things that people can use to get themselves out of the lower rung of society.

My creative partner is a writer, and he's got an executive producing credit on this film. We've made three films together and I would never underestimate the impact of a writer.

When I finish a film, I put it away and I never look at it again.

Music has always been an important thing to me in my life and understand I've worked in the music business.

But the process of making a film is not glamorous. Certainly not my films.

Because when you have millions of people with this kind of need for gratification, and the culture is saying that it's possible for everyone to satisfy all of their needs and desires all of the time, there are obviously going to be clashes - clashes of ego.

The director's job should give you a sense of music without drawing attention to itself.

I'm not in front of the camera, they are. I encourage them; I build up as much of their confidence and ego as possible. They've got to take control; I can't act it out.

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.

If he didn't fall in love he would have never come back near the end of the film. Because, what man is going to dishonor himself so that he comes back in front of the man that took a woman away from him... and warns her to save her life?

Robert Altman's Nashville is my all-time favorite film because it covers all the bases - it's original, moving, and has something to say, but also funny and incredibly entertaining.

I never see a novel as a film while I'm writing it. Mostly because novels and films are so different, and I'm such an internal novelist.

I have a movie coming out called Spun, which will be at the Toronto Film Fest.

Well ironically my last three roles have all been a mother. One was a Canadian film where the baby was taken away because she is a drug addict, in Irish Jam I play a mother to a four year old. I think in the future I'll be able to handle the role with a lot more depth.