There are some amazing stories from all over this country, where people's work and contribution has been acknowledged. To be part of that is an absolutely fantastic feeling.

I love thrillers, and I always have.

The BAFTA is both absolutely fantastic and sort of meaningless at the same time.

I was stuck in a wheelchair playing this deranged villain. I felt this mass amount of rage at being so confined. I thought, 'What can I do that is the direct opposite of this situation?' The only thing I could think of was that I could sing and dance.

I've always loved the Bond films.

I don't know that there is too far, actually. I think there's only too bad. If it's bad you've gone too far.

I saw Derek Jacobi play Hamlet when I was 17, and he directed me as Hamlet when I was 27, and I directed him as Claudius in 'Hamlet' when I was 35, and I'm hoping we meet again in some other production of Hamlet before we both toddle off.

I remember the first book I bought, when I was about 11... Dad said, 'What have you got that for? What are libraries for?'

What happens is that with difficult processes on a film, they get very intensely compressed because a clock is ticking.

I only really cast people who are desperate to be in it - who were dying to be in it, whose talent I believed in and were dead ready to do the work that was necessary.

Mozart had a tremendously fertile and creative ear for a catchy tune.

I'm very conscious of the fact the directing career has taken some odd turns. Maybe there's enough bulk where I'm now pigeonholed in the 'eclectic box.'

My experience of great storytelling, working with classics, is just finding a way to present it simply but let the story do its own work, or be an invite to the audience's imagination.

What you want is the opportunity to work and an audience. Prizes after that are just a great big bonus.

In the hands of a great poet, words have ways of affecting us in ways we don't understand.

The Chinese say, 'It's good to live in interesting times.'

It's very strange that the people you love are often the people you're most cruel to.

I've lived a lot of my life in London, so I often feel that I am a Londoner.

I went to a comprehensive school and didn't go to university.

What I've found about 'Cinderella' is that what it provokes in an audience is really extraordinary. It appears to be a deceptively simple tale, but I've heard nothing but people drawing all different things out of it.

The glory of 70mm is the sharpness of the image it offers.

I loved 'Kundun.'

I think that short films often contain an originality, a creative freedom, an energy and an invention that is inspiring and entertaining. I think they are, as Shakespeare put it, a good deed in a naughty world.

I certainly have been guilty of trying to sweep things under the carpet.