Equality is not a concept. It's not something we should be striving for. It's a necessity. Equality is like gravity. We need it to stand on this earth as men and women, and the misogyny that is in every culture is not a true part of the human condition. It is life out of balance, and that imbalance is sucking something out of the soul of every man and woman who's confronted with it. We need equality. Kinda now.
If you're going to make a science fiction movie, then have a hover craft chase, for God's sake.
Everything is a drug. Family, art, causes, new shoes... We're all just tweaking our chem to avoid the void.
I'm well aware when they fired the starting gun I was halfway down the track, but I still ran as fast as I could for 25 years.
This is something that I do consider to be good advice: I took my first paycheck and I put it in the goddamn bank. Then I took my second paycheck and put it in the goddamn bank. I had seen the roller coaster of my father's career - top of the world, then unemployed - and I never wanted to take a job because I needed money.
The one thing a creator can bring to the table when everybody else has all the money and power is centeredness and the ability to walk away. Never sit at a table you can't walk away from.
I could not conceive that [fans] actually wanted me to sign something. It took a long time for me to figure out (a) just say 'Thank you' and sign the thing, and (b) smile in the picture, because if you try to just half-smile you're going to look constipated.
I'm the least confident person in so many ways. But I believed that if somebody gave me the chance to tell a story, I would tell a story [well enough] that the person who gave me the chance would get their money back.
Somebody once asked me if I have anything like faith, and I said I have faith in the narrative. I have a belief in a narrative that is bigger than me, that is alive and I trust will work itself out.
You go to movies to see people you love suffer - that's why you go to the movies. You don't go to see a movie about a guy who already knows he has a wonderful life.