Use filmmaking to eliminate racism – use to it terminate misogyny – use it to destroy homophobia and all other primitiveness.

The art of filmmaking is the most influential form of art that has ever existed throughout the history of human artistic endeavors.

Filmmaking has the power to fortify the feeble, unify the divided, raise the abandoned and inspire the ignorant.

A movie is not a movie, it is a potential nuclear furnace of inspiration, courage and conscience.

Make movies my friend – make nice, inspiring and bold movies that will penetrate the darkest corners of the human mind and illuminate the soul.

Give people films, they will forget after a few weeks, but give people ideas, they will assimilate them into their consciousness.

Make films that purify the soul with the flow of rational, vigorous and compassionate thinking.

Use filmmaking for a greater purpose, than to just entertain some drowsy minds. Wake the whole world up with your movies. It has been sleeping for long. Its eternal sleep has become its darkest nemesis. Now is the time to wake it up.

Take the clapper and become the alarm that the world so desperately needs.

Whatever genre you deem suitable for your taste – romance, comedy, action, mystery, sci-fi or anything else, make sure it has the plain everyday human kindness.

Shooting Willoughby carrying Marianne up the path. ... Male strength -- the desire to be cradled again? ... I'd love someone to pick me up and carry me off. Frightening. Lindsay assures me I'd start to fidget after a while. She's such a comfort.

Lindsay [Doran] goes round the table and introduces everyone -- making it clear that I am present in the capacity of writer rather than actress, therefore no one has to be too nice to me.

Difficult for actors to extemporise in nineteenth-century English. Except for Robert Hardy and Elizabeth Spriggs, who speak that way anyway.

I ask Laurie if it's possible to get trained fish. Lindsay says this is how we know I've never produced a movie.

A Film has the potential to kindle such a spark of inspiration in an individual that it can alter the course of human progress.

Entertain, but also, give the viewer something to think about.

Healthy entertainment does not evoke raw emotions in the mind of a viewer only to make them wreak havoc, rather it guides those emotions in a healthy direction.

Healthy entertainment is a beautiful blend of stimuli that can connect with the viewer at a sentimental level, then sow the seeds of a certain idea or feed the mind with inspiration and courage. In short, healthy entertainment does not evoke raw emotions in the mind of a viewer only to make them wreak havoc, rather it guides those emotions in a healthy direction. This leads to not only an entertained viewer, but also an inspired soul. And that should be the purpose of film-making, and indeed the entire entertainment industry, rather than feeding the general population with garbage.

The fire alarm went off. Fire engines came racing; we all rushed out on the gravel drive, everyone thinking it was us. In fact, one of the elderly residents of Saltram had left a pan on the oven in her flat. Apparently this happens all the time. The tenant in question is appearing as an extra -- playing one of the cooks.

The first time we did cavalry charge I was so breathless with excitement I nearly fell off the horse. I actually saw stars in front of my eyes and thought I was going to faint. The second time I had a bit more control but was still giddy with excitement. And the third time I was an emotional wreck. I had to really try hard not to cry.

An actor is just a part of a movie, but director - he is the movie.

Jane reminds us that God is in his heaven, the monarch on his throne and the pelvis firmly beneath the ribcage. Apparently rock and roll liberated the pelvis and it hasn't been the same since.

I seem finally to have stopped worrying about Elinor, and age. She seems now to be perfectly normal -- about twenty-five, a witty control freak. I like her but I can see how she would drive you mad. She's just the sort of person you'd want to get drunk, just to make her giggling and silly.

We've hired the calmest babies in the world to play the hysterical Thomas. One did finally start to cry but stopped every time Chris [Newman (assistant director)] yelled 'Action'. ... Babies smiled all afternoon. Buddhist babies. They didn't cry once. We, however, were all in tears by 5 p.m.

(On period costume posture coaching:)"We all stand about like parboiled spaghetti being straightened out.

Our first point of discussion is the hunt. (...) My idea is to start the film with an image of the vixen locked out of her lair which has been plugged up. Her terror as she's pursued across the country. This is a big deal. It means training a fox from birth or dressing up a dog to look like a fox. Or hiring David Attenbrorough, who probably knows a few foxes well enough to ask a favour.

Shooting Willoughby carrying Marianne up the path. They did it four times. 'Faster,' said Ang [Lee]. They do it twice more. 'Don't pant so much,' said Ang. Greg [Wise (playing Willoughby)], to his great credit, didn't scream.