Well the thing is that the New York of 1846 to 1862 was very different from downtown New York now. Really nothing from that period still exists in New York.

I've always liked 3D.

Most people have stereo vision, so why belittle that very, very important element of our existence?

I love studying Ancient History and seeing how empires rise and fall, sowing the seeds of their own destruction.

I mean I have a project that I have been wanting to make for quite a while now; and basically, it's a story of my parents growing up in the Lower East Side.

A lot of what I'm obsessed with is the relationship and the dynamics between people and the family, particularly brothers and their father.

I don't really see many people... don't really go anywhere either.

I'd like to do a number of films. Westerns. Genre pieces. Maybe another film about Italian Americans where they're not gangsters, just to prove that not all Italians are gangsters.

The fact that food plays such an important part in my films has everything to do with my family.

The most important thing is, how can I move forward towards something that I can't articulate, that is new in storytelling with moving images and sound?

The bottom line is, I tend to be going back to older and older music.

I'm re-energized by being around people who mean a lot to me.

My whole life has been movies and religion. That's it. Nothing else.

My father had this mythological sense of the old New York, and he used to tell me stories about these old gangs, particularly the Forty Thieves in the Fourth Ward.

Death comes in a flash, and that's the truth of it, the person's gone in less than 24 frames of film.

The Five Points was the toughest street corner in the world. That's how it was known. In fact, Charles Dickens visited it in the 1850s and he said it was worse than anything he'd seen in the East End of London.

You don't make pictures for Oscars.

My working-class Italian-American parents didn't go to school, there were no books in the house.

It seems to me that any sensible person must see that violence does not change the world and if it does, then only temporarily.

I think when you're young and have that first burst of energy and make five or six pictures in a row that tell the stories of all the things in life you want to say... well, maybe those are the films that should have won me the Oscar.

The term 'giant' is used too often to describe artists. But in the case of Akira Kurosawa, we have one of the rare instances where the term fits.

I think all the great studio filmmakers are dead or no longer working. I don't put myself, my friends, and other contemporary filmmakers in their category. I just see us doing some work.

People want to classify and say, 'OK, this is a gangster film.' 'This is a Western.' 'This is a... ' You know? It's easy to classify and it makes people feel comfortable, but it doesn't matter, it doesn't really matter.

I also saw the Dalai Lama a few times.

I think all of us, under certain circumstances, could be capable of some very despicable acts. And that's why, over the years, in my movies I've had characters who didn't care what people thought about them. We try to be as true to them as possible and maybe see part of ourselves in there that we may not like.

Film in the 20th century, it's the American art form, like jazz.

The best I can do is to make a film every two years.

If everything moves along and there are no major catastrophes we're basically headed towards holograms.

I wish I could do everything in 3D.

I make different films now.

Eradicating a religion of kindness is, I think, a terrible thing for the Chinese to attempt.

I go through periods, usually when I'm editing and shooting, of seeing only old films.

When I'm making a film, I'm the audience.

Some of my films are known for the depiction of violence. I don't have anything to prove with that any more.

I grew up in the Lower East Side, an Italian American - more Sicilian, actually.

Any film, or to me any creative endeavour, no matter who you're working with, is, in many cases, a wonderful experience.

Very often I've known people who wouldn't say a word to each other, but they'd go to see movies together and experience life that way.

Cinema is a matter of what's in the frame and what's out.

People have to start talking to know more about other cultures and to understand each other.

I love the look of planes and the idea of how a plane flies. The more I learn about it the better I feel; while I still may not like it, I have a sense of what is really happening.

There are two kinds of power you have to fight. The first is the money, and that's just our system. The other is the people close around you, knowing when to accept their criticism, knowing when to say no.

I would ask: Given the nature of free-market capitalism - where the rule is to rise to the top at all costs - is it possible to have a financial industry hero? And by the way, this is not a pop-culture trend we're talking about. There aren't many financial heroes in literature, theater or cinema.

There must be people who remember World War II and the Holocaust who can help us get out of this rut.

And as I've gotten older, I've had more of a tendency to look for people who live by kindness, tolerance, compassion, a gentler way of looking at things.

Being a father at a later age is different from when I had my other two daughters when I was in my 20s and 30s. If you're in your 60s and you're with the kid every day, you're dealing with the mind of a child, so it opens up that childishness in you again.

I was born in 1942, so I was mainly aware of Howard Hughes' name on RKO Radio Pictures.

It's very good for me to remember what actors go through.

I think there's only one or two films where I've had all the financial support I needed. All the rest, I wish I'd had the money to shoot another ten days.

Howard Hughes was this visionary who was obsessed with speed and flying like a god... I loved his idea of what filmmaking was.