Whenever I've shot my previous films, I've felt phantoms of my own cinema past and personal past hovering over me. They accompanied me through those … - Pedro Almodóvar

For me today, the most important filmmaker alive, for me personally is Pedro Almodóvar. Because he takes people on the fringes of society and they are bizarre. And If you read about them in the newspapers, you would think they were criminals. But in an Almodóvar film, you forgive them and you even learn to love them, which I think is closer to godliness, than making a film about good people running around.

In fact I was never the son my parents wanted. I mean, I think that they really loved me. But it’s something I realised from a very young age.

I'm an artist…and I'm part of every decision in a movie. This is not how they work in Hollywood. There, the director is part of the crew, not the main creator. I'm too old to change now. I wouldn't know how to do it.