Cinema is a very difficult and serious art, it requires sacrificing of yourself. You should belong to it, it shouldn't belong to you. Cinema uses your life, not vice versa.

You have to not be arrogant and say you know better, and you have to not thwart their creativity because they are creative people and they have a very different point-of-view than a filmmaker on how to get people in the seats. So, it’s a balance, like everything in life, between keeping your focus and being overly constricting. So, if you want to be a filmmaker, you have to realize what a long arbiter a movie is cut of and shaped on, how many phases there are to it, and how long you have to be totally focused on your story and the movie itself, and how it seemed one way but making a film is really trench warfare.

I think the art of filmmaking is something you learn through actions, by doing it, not by learning theories. And as you do it, your mind starts to change.

I come from theater, and I love acting with my body. You get to do that an awful lot in theater, but you don’t get to do it as much in film because film is about the close-up generally. And theater is always by necessity in a wide shot.

This is not just a qualification industry, you need to give your body and soul to play a character

You have to be a filmmaker, and then you have to be a lawyer as well.

I am looking for excellence. Anyone can struggle but they cannot make a ‘perfect’ film.

There are times that we need to up our games as actors, producers and other professions in the film making industry; we need to be professional and do things right. The fault in our movies did not just happen because we lack money, they also come with the way we handle things as professionals, though, money is also a big factor.There are other things that are attached to film making which we need to look at to move the industry forward

Just make the film. Action is the first word you must learn. And the second is patience. As a filmmaker you must wait for many things. You have to wait for money, the weather, the cast, the release. So you need to have good patience. The process is so long and most of the time it’s frustrating. To be a filmmaker, you must first take action, then have the persistence to pursue it.

Making a movie has to be artistic. You have to look back and say, ‘I did this because I had fun.’

I believe a great film has to be, first of all, artistic. It has to be beautifully done. Nowadays there are just so many films and TV shows out there that it's like fast food. And there's no strong artistic element to it. And secondly, a great film has to be deep. It has to be impactful. And tell an amazing story.

The principle behind the cinema, like that behind all the arts, rests on a choice. It is, in Camus' words, "the revolt of the artist against the real." If one holds to this principle, what difference can it make by what means reality is revealed? Whether the author of a film seizes on the real in a novel, in a newspaper story or in his own imagination, what counts is the way he isolates it, stylizes it, makes it his own.

People often ask me the challenges of a female filmmaker, but com'on it makes no difference. It's not a gender thing. It's all about filmmaking and how serious you're. For me, if you have an opportunity to make a film, just do it. If you don't get it all right, the first time, try again, it's a process.

To be an actor, you have to be a child.