I direct a lot of TV commercials and music videos.

The thing is there have been American movies that are similar to Solaris, like Alien had a lot of things that are similar, although it's also got the horror element.

Coppola has problems getting financing, so why should I not have problems getting financing.

After living in LA for 8 years, I sort of wanted a change, but there's not much production in New York, which is where I primarily live, so I just sort of drifted over to London.

I think movies are good for getting into dream states or exploring weird alternate states of thinking.

I actually did use to sell shoes.

I really love sort of classical cinema where people were telling stories with very little dialogue, and people were using the camera in a really interesting way.

Like I said about Freaked, people tend to find these films, and I think that in the end the cool thing about a movie is that it can be sort of burnt temporarily, but then it's burnt into the fabric of your culture.

I get very driven by certain themes and ideas.

The thing about movies these days is that the commerce end of it is so inflated and financiers are just expecting this enormous return on their investment.

It's hard for a hit to be bad for your career.

They're innocent movies, and they're fun movies and there were no pretensions about 'em.

Certain remakes are great. Carpenter's The Thing is better than the original.

The film, even when we were making it in that budget range, which was really a coup - we got it made because we pitched it to the studio head, Joe Roth.

I'm not trying to be some kind of underground renegade.

I think filmmakers want their movies to be seen.

I'm not saying it isn't frustrating that my films haven't gotten a bigger release, but I'm really happy with them and if you just keep cranking and eventually, if you have a certain sensibility, some of your movies will hit and some just won't.

I just like movies that somehow expose the world in a way that's different than you imagine it.

The trick of making movies in this culture is how to not give up everything that makes them worthwhile in order to get them made - and that's a tricky balance.

That's kind of the weird thing that M. Night Shyamalan has sort of unleashed upon the world is this need for every movie to have these ridiculous endings.

I direct a lot of TV commercials and music videos.

My favorite favorites are people like Bunuel, Fellini and Charlie Chaplin.

I'm one of the few people who really like Eyes Wide Shut.

I'm really influenced by so many different things.

With Fever, the film was so made for the screen, and there's so much surround sound that was done for the film - enormous detail paid to that. I wasn't thinking video, because I didn't know how it was going to turn out.

Same thing, like my commercials are often times really funny because I tend to find 30 seconds is a really good amount of time to tell a joke.

But it is funny, because I saw Unbreakable recently and it's a strange movie, I didn't mind it, and it's got some interesting things going on.

Hitchcock had to fight to the death to make his movies.

I take a lot from everywhere. I take from music, architecture, novels, and plays. Anywhere that hits you.

Certain remakes are great. Carpenters the thing is better than the original.

When you use music to worship you are not attempting to entertain.

Pop music, disco music, and heavy metal music is about shutting out the tensions of life, putting it away.

When I did the record, I was coming off a time when my contract had been sold and the music industry had changed a lot. I didn't understand how to make records for big labels. I was waiting for a new kind of record label to emerge.

You've got to realize. In the western world, regardless of what color you are, what title the music is, it's all played by the same notes.

Don't make music for some vast, unseen audience or market or ratings share or even for something as tangible as money. Though it's crucial to make a living, that shouldn't be your inspiration. Do it for yourself.

Whether I'm doing music or I'm walking down the street or I'm in a record store buying a record or I walk into a comic store and I'm buying comics or having a drink with my friends, it's the same me.

When rock came along the lyrics and melodies became less important and it bothered me to think that perhaps they might not regain the value they have to music - they are music.

I want to promote poetry to the point where you got all the baldhead kids running around doing poetry, getting the music out of the way and having only words, the spoken word, and then see what happens.

There is no music that can't be used politically, but the motives behind the creation of that music can be non-political.

The kind of music or the kind of arrangements that I do, the kind of musicians I choose, is just what I like to hear.

If not for music, I would probably be a very frustrated scientist. It's one way to answer the question, 'What is the meaning of life?' I feel music answers it better.

Since I'm allergic to various things, the army wouldn't accept me during the war, and I got into the Office of War Information, which sent music to Europe.

My singing is my hobby. It's me and my brother. We just enjoy writing music.

I was determined to carve out a music of my own. I didn't want to copy anybody.

I have tried to make the music a bit easier for them to understand.

What makes my approach special is that I do different things. I do jazz, blues, country music and so forth. I do them all, like a good utility man.

That music and the lyrical aspects of Razorblade Romance is so personal to me that, now with me being grown up a bit and meeting new people and doing new things, it makes me look at the same things I was writing about back in the day through a different colored lens.

The only time I would like to see was the 20s and 30s in America because I love the music and the style and the optimism, I wanted to see New York being built. I wanted to see all that, you know.

My big love was the Beatles. I was more into music.