Peter weir

When I began making films, they were just movies: 'What's the new movie? What are you doing?' Now they're called 'adult dramas.'

With more time I like to see the actors find something of their own places, so I can get their own ideas before I put mine in. Given they have a better idea more often enough.

Silent films were, I think, more different than we know to sound films. We think of it as simply that we added dialogue and in actual fact I think it was an entirely different art form.

There's almost a fear that if you understood too deeply the way you arrived at choices, you could become self-conscious. In any case, many ideas which are full of personal meaning seem rather banal...

National film industries tend to move in cycles. In Australia right now, we're on a high, a feeling of potential, which as yet shows no sign of flagging. But the word 'industry' is misleading. A small...

Music stops you from thinking.

You can mix in certain sensitivities as a filmmaker.

There was a point of frustration, where I thought I should just take a film, even though I didn't want to. I was impatient with being at home. But I hung on to the approach I've always had, which is...

Movies tie things up in an arbitrary length of time, but I have always liked things that aren't fully realised.

It was immediately apparent that it was full of tricky ingredients to balance. In fact, I found it very intriguing. What held me back from saying yes to the producer was that I wasn't sure who could...