Quotes

Defining a commercial film? It's a movie where you know everything. So, it's a film you soon forget.

Since I'm a man, very naturally the most important subject for me to describe is women, because they are an enigma for me. So most of the time my protagonists are women. I don't really want my films to be categorized as women's films, because for me my films are about the most important enigma for me in my life, which is women. And I can stress that point not only because I'm a man and a male filmmaker but because Japan still today is predominantly a male society. Men are still the main characters. We've never had a woman prime minister. Women are oppressed, discriminated against, and rejected; they are outside the thinking of the society or the state. So the only way really to look objectively at that male-oriented society is to take the side of women, who are rejected outside that society.