Director Quotes

I don't know what they'll say when I die. I don't give a damn, but they'll probably cry.

I never rehearse. Never! I think it's a waste of time.

I never go anywhere without my iPod.

I loved cinema while growing up and, for the longest time, wanted to be a director.

I love sci-fi because it leads in the imagination, and I always say it has the most intelligent fans in the world.

I like to be working and moving - the worst thing you can do to me is stick me in a room all day while you're lighting a shot. That just kills me.

I just don't like the whole Hollywood thing.

I have a reputation for being an improvisational actor, which is true, but I also know what I'm doing so that if the improvisational strand doesn't work I can go back to what I know's already there.

I hate the word 'hippy.'

I feel like I'm the luckiest man on the planet.

I don't take a great deal of interest in party politics. Social politics interests me a great deal more.

I do tend to divide my childhood into darkness and light, and the first seven years were certainly the darkness.

Hunger's a great spur.

Guys, particularly in the West, go to the gym and train for hours and hours to pick up something that is heavier than them. Why would you want to do that?

Every actor I think has got their own number of takes that they like, you know. Some actors like to go all day, you know on the one scene and some actors want to take two takes. I personally like four.

Each performance and each film is what it is. It's right and belongs within that moment. You look at it and try to make it fit your particular part of your character and your particular film.

Bullying is a terrible, terrible thing.

Biologically, I'm lucky - an angular face and dark colouring which shows up well on camera.

Anyone who knows anything about me knows that I am a very patriotic guy, in terms of my Scottishness and my roots.

Anyone that knows me knows what I'm about, and I'm very much a British actor, a European actor.

Acting, the arts in general, is a magnet for the wounded of society.

Acting is a really insular thing.

A lot of the characters I play have problems, they are marginalised, they have serious psychological problems, problems with relationships, with childhood. These are big subjects, big subjects. You can't balk at work like that. As an actor, that's as good as it gets.

A lot of Scots have settled in Canada over the years and it's a very easy place for Scots - they understand us, we understand them.

A lot of my work is with children and there's a reason for that, because they really level you.

Acting is probably the greatest therapy in the world. You can get a lot stuff out of you on the set so you don't have to take it home with you at night. It's the stuff between the lines, the empty space between those lines which is interesting.

Whenever a situation develops to its extreme, it is bound to turn around and become its opposite.

My advice to young film-makers is this: don't follow trends, start them!

In our film profession you may have Gable's looks, Tracy's art, Marlene's legs or Liz's violet eyes, but they don't mean a thing without that swinging thing called courage.

If you want to send a message, try Western Union.