I had to choose between American and British actors, and it didn't take me more than a second to decide: Russians are Europeans and should be played by other Europeans. |
Today's cinema is a global art form, it is impossible to make movies for a market the size of France, representing no more than 4% of the world's total. |
The world distribution of French movies is a laughing matter. That is a fact. |
To do the writing, I have to have time to do research. |
When Americans shoot movies they aim at the entire planet. When the French make movies, they aim at Paris. |
America is the only country capable of producing national movies: its culture has become a global culture. |
When you create a movie, you create something in your image. |
My way of remaining French was the financing scheme I used for Quest for Fire, with Fox funds, since it started as a 100% American production. The film was not in French and yet was French in style, reflecting my personality. |
When a French book becomes an international hit it is because of the author and not because of the language. The same goes for movies. |
I make movies just as painters paint: I work where I can. |
The financing of my films has always been international. |
British actors behave like Europeans; they are also extremely well trained. |
If you make a movie about Elizabeth I, how much of the dialogue is her real words? Audiences know when they go see a movie that it is fiction. |
When Picasso painted in Paris, was he a Spanish or a French painter? It does not matter, he was Picasso, whatever the influences surrounding him. He simply chose Paris because it was the ideal place for him to sell his creation. |
There is a broad cultural current that conveys the idea that a film is like a football team, it represents a nation, it is illustrated literature, filmed radio. These are outdated concepts, totally out of touch with today's realities. |
War scenes are less difficult than love scenes. |
The art of motion pictures is pictorial and language comes a distant second. |
The French have got to understand that a film is so expensive that it can no longer afford to be regional or even national in scope. |
I think it is a mistake to identify a movie according to its language, as if movies were literature. |