But once Haig Manoogian started talking about film, I realized that I could put that passion into movies, and then I realized that the Catholic vocation was, in a sense, through the screen for me

[on Stanley Kubrick] Why does something stay with you for so many years? It's really a person with a very powerful storytelling ability. A talent... a genius, who could create a solid rock image that has conviction.

[on Stanley Kubrick] One of his films... is equivalent to 10 of somebody else's.

[on working with Liza Minnelli on New York, New York (1977)] After 15 minutes I realized that not only could she sing she could be one hell of an actress. She's so malleable and inventive. And fun, even when things are hard.

[on Robert De Niro] And even now I still know of nobody who can surprise me on the screen the way he does -- and did then. No actor comes to mind who can provide such power and excitement.

[about The Departed (2006)] It's the only movie of mine with a plot.

[onstage at the 2007 Oscars after winning for Best Director] Could you double-check the envelope . . . ?

Cinema is a matter of what's in the frame and what's out.

What does it take to be a filmmaker in Hollywood? Even today I still wonder what it takes to be a professional or even an artist in Hollywood. How do you survive the constant tug of war between personal expression and commercial imperatives? What is the price you pay to work in Hollywood? Do you end up with a split personality? Do you make one movie for them, one for yourself?

[on the Iraq war] There are a lot of Americans who also feel that a lot of this war talk is economic, part of this has to do with the oil. I think it really has to come down to respecting how other people live. There's got to be ways this can be worked out diplomatically, there simply has to be.

[on "political correctness] You can hardly say anything about minorities now. It has made it extremely difficult to open your mouth.

[on the Iraq war] One hopes that this kind of war can be done diplomatically, with intelligence rather than wiping out a lot of innocent civilians.

I'm a lapsed Catholic. But I am Roman Catholic - there's no way out of it.

There is no such thing as pointless violence. "City of God" [Cidade de Deus (2002)], is that pointless violence? It's reality, it's real life, it has to do with the human condition. Being involved in Christianity and Catholicism when I was very young, you have that innocence, the teachings of Christ. Deep down you want to think that people are really good - but the reality outweighs that.

My whole life has been movies and religion. That's it. Nothing else.

I prefer celluloid - there's no doubt about it. Yet I know that if I was starting to make movies now, as a young person, if I could get my hands on a DV camera, I probably would have started that way . . . There's no doubt I'm an older advocate of pure celluloid, but ultimately I see it going by the wayside, except in museums, and even then it could be a problem.

It probably is better I didn't win in the '70s or mid-'80s or something. My view on making films is somewhat different in a way, and I think maybe it's something that . . . I was not able to handle at the time . . . Had I gotten an Oscar, maybe I would have gotten maybe an extra two days shooting, maybe a couple, you know what I'm saying?

If I continue to make films about New York, they will probably be set in the past. The "new" New York I don't know much about. It's not that I'm against contemporary film. I'm open to it in general, but I find the new colors of the city, the new Times Square, kind of shocking. I guess I'm stuck in a time warp.

I'm in a different chapter of my life. As time goes by and I grow older, I find that I need to just be quiet and think. There have been periods when I've locked myself away for days, but now it's different - I'm married and we have a daughter who is in my office the whole time.

I think a lot of it has to do with the nature of the community. I've lived here in Los Angeles, but I'm more of a New Yorker, and the nature of my films is regarded as somewhat violent and the language is considered tough. As you grow older, you change. I make different films now. You don't make pictures for Oscars.