I loved 'Fantasia' as a kid because it filled me with wonder, enchantment and awe. It was my first real introduction into classical music. It was totally inspiring to me.
— Nicolas Cage
I want people to discover my movies, and however they choose to receive it is their business.
I try not to be proud. I try to actively attack pride.
I believe that there's a way to question authority with manners, with dignity. There's no reason to be rude about it.
The movies I cannot go without and that I watch annually are 'A Clockwork Orange,' 'Scarface' and 'Fantasia.'
If I do do a sequel, I'm going to have to know for sure that the script is better than the original. So I'm going to be very careful about that because I'm not eager to repeat myself.
Every great story seems to begin with a snake.
I'll speak for myself, but there's a lot of humor to be found in sarcasm and darkness. You talk to any paramedic, they survive by developing a pretty off-kilter sense of humor.
I do enjoy animated movies. I really love anime and movies like 'Spirited Away' and 'Howl's Moving Castle.'
When I won the Oscar, I made a point of actively going against that and doing adventure films like 'Con Air' and 'Gone in 60 Seconds,' not what would be expected.
When you start a movie, it's not like other kinds of work that you have when you know your boss for years or colleagues for years. You're meeting everyone, mostly, for the first time. You have to get comfortable with those people so you can perform, because the first thing that is going to shut you down is any kind of anxiety.
Acting is like any other art form, in that you have the option to go very big or go very small.
I knew I wanted to be an actor when I was very young. I guess I was about 6 years old at the time, and I was fascinated by television. I started having waking fantasies where I was in a movie and there were crane shots of me during a scene.
Just because you're a man doesn't mean that you can't raise your kid. I think that families should stay together, but if you are a single father, don't give up no matter what they say.
I haven't isolated myself. I am not living on a yacht somewhere. I am not tucked away or behind a gate somewhere. I am not flying on a private plane. I am going to the airport, I am with people, some of the interactions are good, some of them are not so good, but it keeps me in touch with being, you know, part of society.
I think I've spent more time in front of a camera than off camera. That's just the way it is.
My father once said, 'If you're in the desert and you're dying of thirst, are you going to drink a glass of blood or are you going to drink a glass of water?' I think what he was trying to say, interesting coming from my blood father, is sometimes there are people in your family that can be toxic.
The end of the world is on people's minds. We have the power to destroy or save ourselves, but the question is what do you do with that responsibility.
I've gotten pretty good at leaving characters on the set. I go home and try to relax and regroup and be ready for the next day.
Everything we do impacts someone else's life.
Personally, my interests are ancient history and ancient civilizations. In my own life, I'd like to go to places like Easter Island.
I like both Blu-ray and DVD, but Blu-ray gives you more options.
I'm not contractually obligated to sequels on anything.
Zoology has always been interesting to me. Nature is fascinating.
In this day and age, where you have a lot of comic book movies made every day, and most of them are really good boys, it's important to have a couple bad boys out there, too.
Mel Blanc is a hero because of what he could do with his voice for all the Looney Tunes, the Warner Brothers cartoons, to be the voice of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd, Porky Pig. To me, he's a great actor.
Snakes are sometimes perceived as evil, but they are also perceived as medicine. If you look at an ambulance, there's the two snakes on the side of the ambulance. The caduceus, or the staff of Hermes, there's the two snakes going up it, which means that the venom can also be healing.
I definitely went through my magic phase. I think all little boys do at some point or another - they get fascinated by magic tricks.
I would love to work with Tim Burton. I think we would be very good together.
I use technology for communication, but I don't have a Blackberry or an iPhone. I use an outdated cell phone, but I'm fine with it.
Often you hear stories about never working with children. I disagree because children still have that residual magical thinking. They haven't had their imagination knocked out of them by turning into adults and life experiences.
Film acting is one of the only industries where you're criticized for working hard. In any other industry, it's considered a quality and something to behold.
I'm one of those people that feels that Americans that shouldn't do Shakespeare... The rhythms of the English language and the mannerisms of the English speech seems to work effortlessly with William Shakespeare, but when Americans do it, something seems stuck.
Someone like Vincent Price or somebody like Christopher Lee, they never won an award, and it doesn't matter. They're cool.
The best characters are the ones that somehow manage to be both attractive and repulsive at the same time. If you do that, you're at the center of the universe - if you can find characters who are more ambiguous and can raise more questions than answers.
One of the pluses of getting older is you set some limits.
Helen Mirren is someone that I have really admired ever since I saw her in 'Excalibur.' That was the first thing I said to her. 'I loved you as Morgan Le Fay.'
Children, to me, are of the utmost importance. They're really the future, aren't they?
Film has lost something in the translation to high tech. It's become so super-real. It's with digital this and stereo that, and everything's like a CD.
I have dogs, and it's no secret that I find reptiles interesting, but the thing about reptiles is that they really just wanna be left alone, and I understand them. It's, 'Don't pick me up, stop holding me, don't look at me, just leave me alone.' I have to admit, sometimes I feel like that.
Mike Myers as Austin Powers makes me laugh - that was genius - and Daffy Duck makes me laugh, but I like odd behavior. I don't like hip dialogue and one-liners and all that sort of cool, sophomoric comedy. It's just not for me.
I like movies where you feel like you're going into another world, and no matter how many times you watch it, you're gonna see something new in that world. That level of detail really inspires me.
I've always maintained that I see myself as a student. There's always something to learn and be challenged by and hopefully grow from.
I'm not a trained actor. I'm someone who is autodidactic and learned on my own.
You get dinged for wanting to do a comedy, then wanting to do a big-budget action film, and then wanting to do an indie. But you can't let other people trying to label you get in the way of trying to do something artistically.
I've always had an interest in Louisiana, especially New Orleans.
I'm not really gadget oriented. I'm not into technology or computers. I'm not good at interfacing with that sort of gear.
Good science fiction is intelligent. It asks big questions that are on people's minds. It's not impossible. It has some sort of root in the abstract.
My house is basically a trailer. I live a circus lifestyle. I'm always moving. It's not always easy for people that live with me, but that's the path I chose.
You can choose your family sometimes. You can choose people, it could be a teacher, it could be a professor, it could be someone you work with that actually genuinely cares about you and wants you to succeed.
