My dad was a labourer and my mum had exactly the same job as Noel Gallagher's mum - she was a dinner lady at our local school. Everyone comes over from Ireland and they get the same jobs.

I made this film 'The Beach,' which didn't take place in a city, and it didn't really suit me.

I've always wanted to do a space movie.

It's a good place when all you have is hope and not expectations.

When I'm writing, I am lost in my book. Except family and close friends, I don't care about what critics, publishers or readers might think.

We went to church every Sunday. When I was a kid, the only time I sang was around my family.

I had an amazing teacher, who was Burmese, and she was living in Paris at the time, and she is one of very few who doesn't actually receive a credit in the film because she still has family over there.

A father may turn his back on his child, brothers and sisters may become inveterate enemies, husbands may desert their wives, wives their husbands. But a mother's love endures through all.