Lincoln believed in the American people.
— Steven Spielberg
When I was very young, I remember my mother telling me about a friend of hers in Germany, a pianist who played a symphony that wasn't permitted, and the Germans came up on stage and broke every finger on her hands. I grew up with stories of Nazis breaking the fingers of Jews.
In high school, I got smacked and kicked around. Two bloody noses. It was horrible.
I even get inspired by movies that aren't very good, because there's always something good in movies that are collectively thought of as a failure. There's good in everything, I find.
I've always been interested in UFOs.
Casting sometimes is fate and destiny more than skill and talent, from a director's point of view.
Documentaries are the first line of education, and the second line of education is dramatization, such as 'The Pacific'.
It all starts with the script: it's not worth taking myself away from my family if I don't have something I'm really passionate about.
As a Jew I am aware of how important the existence of Israel is for the survival of us all. And because I am proud of being Jewish, I am worried by the growing anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism in the world.
I was making a lot of 8mm home movies, since I was twelve, making little dramas and comedies with the neighborhood kids.
So I try to re-invent my own eye every time I tackle a new subject. But it's hard, because everybody has style. You can't help it.
I don't really have a schedule of when I want to show my children my movies.
Whether in success or in failure, I'm proud of every single movie I've ever directed.
I don't drink coffee. I've never had a cup of coffee in my entire life. That's something you probably don't know about me. I've hated the taste since I was a kid.
I never felt comfortable with myself, because I was never part of the majority. I always felt awkward and shy and on the outside of the momentum of my friends' lives.
I don't think any movie or any book or any work of art can solve the stalemate in the Middle East today. But it's certainly worth a try.
There is a fine line between censorship and good taste and moral responsibility.
All presidents swear an oath to the Constitution to keep this country united, and when the country fell apart, Lincoln had to put it back together again, with a lot of help. But he bore total responsibility.
When my children were born, I made the choice I wanted them to be raised as Jews and to have a Jewish education.
I'm always in favor of Israel responding strongly when it's threatened.
A lot of kids only know 'E.T.' from the digitally-enhanced version.
I am a very impatient director.
In the re-creation of combat situations, and this is coming from a director who's never been in one, being mindful of what these veterans have actually gone through, you find that the biggest concern is that you don't look at war as a geopolitical endeavor.
I think documentaries are the greatest way to educate an entire generation that doesn't often look back to learn anything about the history that provided a safe haven for so many of us today.
The only thing that gets me back to directing is good scripts.
From the day I started to think politically and to develop my own moral values, from my earliest youth, I have been an ardent defender of Israel.
Like, I took no poetic license with 'Schindler's List' because that was historical, factual documents.
Most of my presumptions about a production are usually wrong.
I get that same queasy, nervous, thrilling feeling every time I go to work. That's never worn off since I was 12 years-old with my dad's 8-millimeter movie camera.
I go out and look for a good story to tell and if I like it enough and I decide to direct it, I become dangerously involved in becoming a part of that story.
Once a month the sky falls on my head, I come to and I see another movie I want to make.
People have forgotten how to tell a story. Stories don't have a middle or an end any more. They usually have a beginning that never stops beginning.
There is something about killing people at close range that is excruciating. It's bound to try a man's soul.
When I grow up, I still want to be a director.
When I felt like an outsider, movies made me feel inside my own skill set.
There's nothing self-serving about what motivated me to bring 'Schindler's List' to the screen.
I simply adore 'The Simpsons.' I go to bed in a 'Simpsons' T-shirt.
There were so many odd, strange things about Abraham Lincoln that I think nobody knew how to pigeonhole him.
Well, luckily with animation, fantasy is your friend.
For one thing, I don't think that anybody in any war thinks of themselves as a hero.
My dad took me to my first movie. It was 'The Greatest Show on Earth' in 1952, a movie of such scale it was actually a traumatic experience.
One of my daughters is a competitive jumper, we live with horses, we have stables on our property. But I don't ride. I observe, and I worry.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Jihadism have nothing to do with each other.
I committed to directing 'Catch Me If You Can' not because of the divorce component, but principally because Frank Abagnale did things that were the most astonishing scams I had ever heard.
I love my kids as individuals, not as a herd, and I do have a herd of children: I have seven kids.
And I may often question choices I make as a producer. But I've never questioned the choices I make as a director.
If I weren't a director, I would want to be a film composer.
You have many years ahead of you to create the dreams that we can't even imagine dreaming. You have done more for the collective unconscious of this planet than you will ever know.
A lot of the films I've made probably could have worked just as well 50 years ago, and that's just because I have a lot of old-fashion values.
I like the smell of film. I just like knowing there's film going through the camera.
