Wong Kar-wai Quotes

There are certain things that I always dreamed of, like fighting in the UFC. There's just certain things that I feel like haven't been accomplished there. There's such great women coming up in the sport; seems like a wonderful time to be in women's MMA.

I wish there were more kung fu films. They are a part of our culture.

In my camp, we have Minotoro Noguiera and Lyoto Machida.

A lot of Chinese martial arts films were based on Chinese martial arts novels. And these novels created a world of putting history, calligraphy, and martial arts into one.

I'm a trained martial artist. My parents were both martial artists.

To make a kung fu film is like a dream come true, because I'm a big fan of kung fu movies and I'm learning kung fu for a long time.

My role in kung fu - in the art of kung fu, not the series - is not as a practitioner. My role is that of an evangelist, which is an entirely different thing.

To make a film like 'The Grandmaster,' I know I'm not going to make just a standard kung-fu film; it's not going to be just tricks or like wire works. So I spent seven years on the road interviewing different schools and a lot of real grandmasters from Chinese martial arts.

That was always the top martial artist - the Brazilian jiu jitsu black belt. Once I started beating them, I knew I had what it takes to form a new martial art. That's when I came up with Joe Jitsu, my namesake, so my legacy lives forever through the martial arts.

My father created this whole MMA thing.

I grew up in a kung fu house. It wasn't until I got older that I discovered that most families didn't talk about the Shaolin Temple or Jackie Chan at the dinner table.

I respect all the fighters. I respect Georges St-Pierre because Georges has a great story in the UFC. I respect all the fighters in here because this is the biggest sport in the world.

Growing up, all of my friends would set their schedules to the showing of kung fu movies on TV.

The first martial arts movie I ever watched was this old Chinese film called 'Five Deadly Venoms.' I was seven years old. My dad and I were sitting in front of the TV on the floor in our living room.

I didn't and still don't watch sport all that often, but I did see all the Pride fights back in the day, which is when I first saw MMA and I felt that's something I really want to do.

I don't really want to be compared to Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan, but I really feel honored and really proud that people actually see me as them or similar to them, and because they are my inspiration for what I have become today. I am really honored that people compare me to those people.

While filming 'The Matrix,' we studied how a Chinese fight-choreography team trains actors before production starts so that they can participate in action sequences in a more dynamic way.

I think the book struck me in a few ways that I thought very interesting to pick it as my first martial arts film. It has a very strong female character and it was very abundant in classic Chinese textures.

I had just turned 10-years-old when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and plunged America into World War II.

I've always been interested in Vietnam, feel it's a seminal event in our nation's history, and have explored it over the years - but I hadn't been interested in doing a documentary about it. I felt there had been a lot done about Vietnam, and didn't know if I could add anything new to the discussion.

You're asked, 'Do you know kung-fu?' Yeah. That's what we do. We wake up, we brush our teeth, we do kung-fu!

Heritage is something martial-arts films don't often talk about.

The Japanese invaded Tulagi, in the Solomon Islands, on May 4.

I can pretty much say that because of Bruce Lee and Jean-Claude Van Damme, that's why I do what I do today.

I was in Shanghai when the Japanese invaded China. I was there in Shanghai when, the morning after Pearl Harbor, they seized Shanghai.