We wanted 'Hugo' to be a cornucopia of cinema, a celebration of everything we do in movies.

Everything about 'Hugo' to me is poignant, from the broken orphan to the old man losing his past to the fragility of film itself.

Yippee ki yay, motherfucker!

Isn't that how B movies became popular? ... They would do things that regular cinema didn't.

Any adaptation - and I've done three in my career. I did 'Sweeney Todd' and 'Hugo' and 'Coriolanus.' It's important to find what makes it a movie as opposed to just a film presentation of a stage play.

The reason that I'm a writer today is because of Shakespeare and falling in love with Shakespeare when I was 8. That was through the movies, actually - through Olivier's 'Hamlet.' That was the first thing that got me to fall in love with Shakespeare and movies and everything in one big preadolescent rush.