LEOS CARAX

I don't think men were meant to be interviewed.

I like tragedies, whether they're sci-fi or something else, but I can't say I know much about any genre in particular.

I travel, I read, I write, I have other lives. But when I have a camera, I know that's my country, my island.

Cinema is a territory. It exists outside of movies. It's a place I live in. It's a way of seeing things, of experiencing life. But making films, that's supposed to be a profession.

I don't work with people who ask me questions.

We all get a little tired of being ourselves sometimes. The answer is to reinvent yourself, but how do you do that and what is the cost?

I've always been interested in invisible worlds, and I like to visit digital worlds, you know, any world that's imposed on us.

I'm not only my films, but I'm pretty much my films.

I mostly don't submit to talking about my work because I would like another talk about real life.

Even a fiction film is hard to end. You can going on shooting and editing a documentary forever.

Men talk about art, and artists make art, but should artists talk?

I'm not a cineaste. I've made so few films. Sometimes it feels each one is the last one or the first one.

When I made my first film, I had hardly ever seen a camera before, and I was a young man when I arrived in Paris from the suburbs. At the time, I didn't talk much. I was very shy, so the bluff served me. I was telling people that I had no money, and that I knew how to make films, but I had no proof.

I'm not against the virtual world; it's fascinating, but I don't like the way they try to impose it on us. It's a thing imposed by rich countries.

The virtual world is not the enemy. The pioneers invented a world they believed in, but the followers must follow that world whether they believe in it or not.

Every film starts with two or three images. Then I try to edit these images.

There's a real cowardice in the movie business. If you don't meet the right crazy people, you can't do it.

When I was 16, I felt very relieved to discover cinema. It was like an island where I could see life and death from another perspective. Every young person should be interested in that island. It's a beautiful place.

When I was 16, I discovered this island called cinema and I thought: 'Oh, how wonderful; I'm ready.'

I feel that cinema is my country. But it's not my business.

I'm not especially interested in actors or their life, double, triple identities and all that.

I changed my name when I was 13. I don't know why but it made sense at the time. I wanted another identity. I wanted to reinvent myself.

Video is freeing, but also lazier. You have to recreate the love of the moment.

I care about cinema even though I haven't made many films.

My films start with images, a few images and a few feelings, and I try to edit them together to see the correspondence between these images and these feelings.