I do have this belief that we all have a chance to be great, beautiful people based on how we are raised and our surroundings.

What makes a man is when you go against your own instincts to do to the right thing.

I often found that my favorite scene that I shoot is often one that I cut out, like in 'The Last Castle' and 'The Contender.' If you look at the deleted scenes, some of the best scenes never made it into the film.

I came to the conviction that film criticism, in and of itself, was an art.

I am a liberal. I have always been a liberal.

The First Amendment is the First Amendment for a reason - our most cherished right. But it often creates muddy and uncomfortable situations, ones that are the source of great drama and national self-reflection.

Somebody - and I'm going to guess it was Hitchcock - once said that everyone has their reasons. If you remember that, as a writer, you'll write better than average villains.

It's not such a bad thing to bring some naive optimism to Washington.

The truth is that we're not remaking Sam Peckinpah's 'Straw Dogs,' we're making 'Straw Dogs.' We're taking this story, and we're putting our own spin on it. The mere fact that I have James Marsden in it is an indication that it's a very different film than the one that had Dustin Hoffman in it.

I look at 'Straw Dogs' as a very imperfect movie. It's a little bit slow, and its themes are a little bit murky.

When you do a freeze frame, you have the opportunity to find the exact shot that you want - no guessing.

I have to admit that all of us creatively involved with 'Commander' absolutely intended to put the term 'Madam President' into the zeitgeist. I can't deny it.

I think people were a little premature in writing off violent movies. They're going to continue being made, and audiences will continue going to see them.

I'll tell you this: you can look at all the masculine toughies you want - the Ben Roethlisbergers, the Russell Crowes, the David Petraeuses - but if you want to look at what a man should be - persevering, honest, a person who manifests his intellect into action - you need look no further than Roger Ebert.

Classically, throughout all of our history, the movies in times of crisis have turned to military figures as heroes, because they are the guardians of our nation.

The common denominator of the great women leaders in the world - Indira Gandhi, Margaret Thatcher, Golda Meir - is that they're dramatically nonsexual.

You will never - and I mean never - be able to figure out if I was an Obama guy or a Hillary guy.

I still viewed myself as a reviewer when I was on radio. Was it appropriate for me? I think the answer is it's only inappropriate if I allowed it to affect my film reviewing. I don't think you will find any studio that said, 'Yeah, he went easy on us because he was shopping a script.'

Trump is the opposite of everything Reagan was.

When you make a movie like 'Straw Dogs,' your goal is to have people's eyes remain glued to the screen. It serves you no purpose to turn away from the screen.

There was scarcely a month during 1988 when Thomas Harris' novel, 'The Silence Of The Lambs,' was not on or around the top of the 'New York Times' list of America's bestselling books.

I met Joan Allen at an L.A. Film Critics Awards' dinner, and I said, 'I want to write a movie for you.'

I can be accused of being acerbic as a critic and writer.

Every weekend from, like, 1974 to 1978, I'd trudge over to the Greenwich library, which gathered up almost every major newspaper in the country. I would sit there all day long and read and read and read the reviews. I remember being twelve or thirteen and writing to Judith Crist, Pauline Kael, and Roger Ebert.

Just because the boogeyman of the Soviet Union doesn't exist anymore, it doesn't mean the world is living angelically.

I think that 'Straw Dogs' as a story is eminently re-makable. It can be modernized and Americanized without a problem and without giving up any artistic integrity.

If I have to answer one more time, 'Why did you want to remake 'Straw Dogs?'' with the emphasis on the word 'why,' I'm going to flip out.

When reporters are in the business of obtaining hard facts that service the free flow of information, journalists should have a right to obtain that information without fear of personal ruin or incarceration.

If you look at the greatest performances of women, they're usually older... Anne Bancroft in 'The Graduate,' Kathy Bates in 'Misery.' It's a matter of characters having a life experience that makes them interesting.

I grew up in the home of a political cartoonist, so I was a junkie for politics.

I was just nine years old when 'Straw Dogs' came out, so I can't really speak to the women of the time, but I can tell you that the women of 2011 are not put-upon, and they're not victims.

'Nothing But the Truth' is a journalistic thriller that is set during the end of days for print media.

There seems to be an interest in connecting the history of the past to the present and asking whether things have really changed. Films like 'The Contender' and 'Bulworth' seem quaint compared with Trump!

I've been a huge fan of Steven Bochco's for over two decades.

I grew up during Watergate. I was enamored of the study of that.

No matter how far they rise, women never stop being the caregiver. At the end of the day, women bear the emotional responsibility for their families.

I don't know a nicer guy in the world than Alan Alda.

We need to get young people involved in the running of this country.

You learn quite a bit about your film from test screening audiences.

I promise that if there was no Hillary Clinton, there would still be a 'Commander in Chief' - I want to have a hit show that people enjoy, and really, that's it.

The election of Obama will say as much about the American people as it does about Obama himself - that our Declaration of Independence means what it says in its opening lines, that being the world's greatest nation means that we offer the world's greatest opportunities.

'Monsters of God' isn't just a series close to my heart; it is my heart, and I am very much looking forward to working with my fantastic team in New Mexico to create a top-notch series.

Simply stated, sometimes journalists can only get their information from informants who must remain anonymous in order to protect their careers and sometimes even their lives: Watergate: Confidential sources. The Pentagon Papers: Confidential sources. Enron: Confidential sources.

There's no need to make any film. The word 'need' is pretty strong. But if there's a purpose behind making the film, there can be a justification for it.

As much as I like Michael Moore - and I'm on the same political side as him - I think his documentaries are really a batch of manipulations and lies.

Unfortunately, in this country, when we have the opportunity to be bigots in private, we take it every time.

The ability of the press to print their stories without the government trying to get them to betray their sources is as essential to a free press as the ink it is printed with. Otherwise, who will hold accountable those who hold power over us?

Finding out you're able to do something doesn't necessarily mean you want to do it.

Now, I don't know about my peers, but I get nervous - okay, I genuinely freak out - when an actor starts trying on a Southern accent. That's for Brits trying to find the easiest way to sound American.

Rehearsing is more about blocking in the case of movies, I think, and blocking, of course, is very important to the beauty of a scene.