My films are never about what Hong Kong is like, or anything approaching a realistic portrait, but what I think about Hong Kong and what I want it to be.
I'm not very aware of styles. We never talk about styles before we start shooting, or even during shooting, because I think the film will bring you there.
My study is a converted garage which is largely lined with bookshelves and cardboard boxes filled with manuscripts of my film scripts, plays and books.
'The Princess Bride' is by far the most popular film I've ever done. I don't think I'll ever top it.
I didn't realize that, in doing a documentary, there is this process of discovery. It's not like a film or a play with a set script. It sort of reveals itself.
Many French directors, having now realised there was no more real criticism, that the standards of the past have gone, are very offended about the quality of film criticism.
So I am getting a little bored with defining one type of film as American and the other European or from somewhere else because the division is no longer true.
In the late 1980s the amount of German films was down to four or five percent of the market, and the remaining 95 percent were American. It is now 20 to 30 percent German productions.
Film is a very, very powerful medium. It can either confirm the idea that things are wonderful the way they are, or it can reinforce the conception that things can be changed.
I really have no preference between TV and film. I think that each individual project is its own thing and has a very different style.
Ordinarily if an actor gets chosen for the lead in a film, he or she has already built up a repertoire, and everyone knows what he or she is capable of.
You do get really exhausted doing films. You work such long hours, and after a while, things can get out of perspective, just like if anyone's tired, things get on top of them.
Right now my career is totally schizophrenic, because when an American production like Hitchcock Presents asks to see my work I would never dream of showing them my independent films.
My dream is to work with people like Meryl Streep, Michael Fassbender, Christian Bale and Cate Blanchett. To me, those are true storytellers - genuine people who have stories to tell and make incredible films.
I knew her work very well and I knew that if she offered me a role in her movie, it wouldn't be something stupid. So I agreed to do the film before I read the script.
No matter where I am working, I cannot make a film without 100% creative control and final cut. If there is such a guarantee, I can work anywhere.
You have the massive world that was created by Marvel, and then you have these very intimate actors around you. There was as much character work on this as there would be on a little independent film. So, I felt very fortunate in that sense.
For the three years I was in school training to be an actor, I was told, 'It's very unlikely you'll work at all on the stage or in film', so I feel I have to take all the opportunities I can.
George Lucas was casting about and had heard favourable things about my work in Clockwork Orange and asked me to come in, which of course I did even though no one knew what the film was about!
I had to work out where I was going, what type of films I wanted to make. For that reason, I decided to choose independent productions, less important roles, and I tried theater, too.
A lot of people think theatre must be much harder work than film, but anything histrionic or superfluous gets seen on camera so you have to work to distil it into a complete sense of what's true.
