When I was growing up and somebody like Robert De Niro had a movie come out, it was a cultural event. Because he had such a confidence and a single mission that was so intimate.

Well, I think that when you direct a movie or write it. And in the case of the two movies I did, I wrote and directed, they occupy a special place for you.

The major studios are by and large banks, and they give you what is by and large a loan to make a movie. Like banks, they want their money back plus.

There is a strength of character in the people who have, by and large, never experienced comfort.

The human family is a great one, and the Muslim branch is certainly worth knowing.

To play June, I had an immediate connect with her background and culture. We grew up with the same religion and shared a lot of the same values of family and spirituality. But I was really so inspired by what a modern woman she was.

The importance of human life should be universally respected - and that refers to children before they are born and after. All children have the right to be brought up in a loving two-parent family where the notion of divorce is not even possible.

My dad was a mechanical engineer and a drummer. We had no money, but I never felt we had no money, and that's what I remember now, having my own child. I think, 'Oh so what?' Kids don't go around the house seeing what's wrong with it.