Yoichi Sai "It wasn't like I wanted to make films or wanted to surround myself in a filmmaking environment. I was simply told, 'Here's a job for you. Take it?."

Susumu Hani "I am interested only in the inside of people."

Momoko Ando "What I believe in most is the power of people's imagination to fill in what isn't there. This is one of the reasons why I didn't want to show the two girls having sex."

Tokachi Tsuchiya "I was a bit worried the yakuza were going to turn up at the theatre when we first started screening the film in Tokyo."

Shozin Fukui "The people in the stores in front of which we were shooting liked it and were interested in us. They invited us sometimes to eat with them. Because it was very rare that somebody would make movies in such an extreme way. They liked that..."

Yuki Tanada "I want to be known as a filmmaker, not a woman filmmaker."

Ian Buruma "The idea of racial harmony was part of Japanese propaganda, not a reflection of reality."

Michael Arias "I like working as part of a large group. That's one of the aspects of filmmaking that makes it unique among all the visual arts: the fact that you have a crew of a hundred people all working toward one work of art."

Masanobu Ando "In Japan, filmmakers are so preoccupied with getting the job done that they can never relax on the set."

Inuhiko Yomota "I take a clear distance from Hollywood. This alone puts me at a completely different starting point from most Japanese critics today."

Yoshihiko Matsui "My movies always cause strong arguments between those for and against."

Kenji Murakami "Most of the older filmmakers were all angry with me for making such a personal documentary. They want me to be more political."

Koji Wakamatsu "A true filmmaker doesn't make films from the point of view of those in power. To me, that's a fundamental rule: you have to make films from the perspective of the weak."

Masao Adachi "I try to explore the meaning of the words 'terrorism' and 'terrorist'. After 9/11, one of their original implied meanings - 'against the ruling power' - has become corrupted. In my film I refer to the original derivations of the word as it was first used during the French Revolution."

Kazuhiro Soda "When I come back to Japan I feel like a foreigner. Almost everything looks fascinating to me."

Hiromasa Hirosue "If we find people that will allow us to do 100% what we want to do, of course I wouldn't mind. But otherwise I will just stick with the independent films."

Nobuhiro Yamashita "In Osaka everybody called me Nobu on the set, but in Tokyo I am 'Mr. Director'."

Rinko Kikuchi "There isn't really a system of auditions in Japan. That's why there's a lot of typecasting going on."

Katsuhiro Otomo "I don't mind if somebody else does an adaptation of one of my manga. I don't like repeating myself, and I feel that adapting my own manga is essentially repeating something I've already done once before."

Satoshi Kon "I don't feel I'm a representative of Japan at all, nor that I'm representing myself. I represent the film and the staff of 100 or 200 people behind it."

Takashi Yamazaki "Always isn't really about the past, but the future. People need to take control of their lives. I want people to do that. I made the film for those reasons."

Noriyoshi Ikeya "There is one type of set designer that builds the set according to the director's wishes. But that's not my way. I'm interested in an exchange of ideas between me and the director."

Shunichi Nagasaki "I've told myself that it would be good to do these genre movies the way the producer wants and then I would have a lot of work, but somehow I always deviate from that."

Kankuro Kudo "I like to confuse the audience: they're laughing one moment and then the next they suddenly need to get serious. I like to keep them on their toes and not give them any chance to get bored."

Eiko Tanaka "We're an animation company and we're really interested in putting out anything that falls into the category of animation. We'll do anything that we think sounds interesting."

Yoshinori Chiba "Out of all the V-cinema movies that were made in the 1990s, 80 percent were junk."

Norio Tsuruta "When I saw Ring, I thought 'This looks exactly like what I've been doing!'"

Kohei Oguri "There is no human emotion left in the image that we see of Japan today."

Shinji Aoyama "I want to make a comedy or something, but it never happens. I wonder if there's something in me that's stopping this?"

Kunihiko Tomioka "The idea is to encourage these new young filmmakers with the same chance to direct their first works as I did with Yamashita and Kumakiri."

Jo Shishido and Toshio Masuda "The people who went to see Toei films liked yakuza movies, but people who went to see Nikkatsu films came for the drama."

Lee Sang-Il "I learned filmmaking from analysing my favourite directors. I don't feel I learned all that much at film school."

Sogo Ishii "To get the aggression across on screen I really had to get in there and be really energetic in my use of the camera. My formula was that I had to be ten times as energetic in making the film than what I wanted to express on screen."

Go Shibata "Wouldn't it be interesting to see a film about a handicapped killer?"

Ryuichi Hiroki "Most people can't go to pink theatres, for various reasons, so I wanted to do things the other way round - to bring pink film to the people."

Shinji Aramaki "I believe that Appleseed is spiritually in line with anime in general. It is, in a sense, a new type of animation."

Teruo Ishii "When people refer to filmmaking as my job I'm always a bit embarrassed, because I don't consider what I do as anything more than having a great time."

Kihachiro Kawamoto "There's no such thing as doll animation."

Makoto Shinozaki "We wanted to see if Shinji Aoyama could make a funny movie!"

Mamoru Oshii "My goal is to always make a new movie that nobody has ever seen before. I think I've proven that with Innocence."

Katsuhito Ishii "I felt it would be nice to make a family story in which no big tragic moments happen."

Hirokazu Kore-eda "I used to think that documentary-style filmmaking was impossible in fiction because everything is already set down in the screenplay and the storyboards."

Ryuhei Kitamura "I'll do whatever it takes to make my films. That's the difference between me and other directors."

Tomorowo Taguchi "What my films have in common is that they are all very strange."

Nobuhiro Yamashita "It's the people who are different from the norm who interest me, and especially if they don't realise that they are different."

Yudai Yamaguchi "I wanted to see people saying 'This is just too silly! It can't happen!'"

Donald Richie "I've been married to Japan for a long time."

Takeshi Kitano "It's a bit like a gourmet chef with a very classy restaurant but no customers, who is asked to cook cheaper, more popular food and suddenly sees people lining up to eat"

Kitaro Kosaka "I find it very admirable if people show the strength to try and achieve something, regardless of whether they succeed or not. But this spirit is something that I feel is missing in the attitude of today's Japanese people."

Kiyoshi Kurosawa "I consciously tried to make a non-genre film, but I knew that perceptive viewers would clearly recognise it as a monster movie."

Yusuke Iseya and Takamasa Kameishi "We are responsibly irresponsible."

Takahisa Zeze "Young women in Japan are a lot more open about sex these days. There are a lot more scenes in pink films now that show the women on top of the guys"

Tomoyuki Furumaya "If I told you that I wanted to make a film but couldn't, that would sound better. But actually I didn't have any intention to make a film."

Shinya Tsukamoto "I always wanted to make a film in which every image is infused with eroticism. A totally erotic film. Even Tetsuo I made with that idea in mind."

Yutaka Tsuchiya and Karin Amamiya "If society is static or stagnant you should take action yourself and deal with that stagnancy as an issue"

Katsuyuki Motohiro "For me it was important from the start to make commercial films, films for big audiences"

Tadanobu Asano "I think my life would be no fun at all if I just had to act."

Ryosuke Hashiguchi "My mother still thinks that I will grow breasts one day."

Shunichi Nagasaki "When I explained to the actors what their characters were about, I didn't tell them they would become lovers in the end."

Kazushi Watanabe "By playing the lead role as well as directing I could get paid more."

Satoshi Kon "Female characters are easier to write. With a male character I can only see the bad aspects. Because I am a man I know very well what a male character is thinking."

Hayao Miyazaki "I’m not a storyteller, I’m a man who draws pictures."

Akihiko Shiota "If you want to describe the problems of Japanese society today, teenagers are a fitting symbol. It's always them who are confronted with those problems."

Seijun Suzuki "In my films, time and place are nonsense."

John Williams "There are plenty of interesting stories to be told about everyday people in ordinary situations. Where are the filmmakers who want to do this? Where are the Mike Leighs and Ken Loachs of Japan?"

Masato Harada "What we need in Japan right now, in every sense, is taboo breakers."

Sogo Ishii "Everyone in Japan just complained that they didn't understand my films."

Kazuyoshi Kumakiri "I liberated my own desires for violence and tried to open the inside of my mind to let out all the poison. And it's all there in the film."

Takashi Miike "I'd like to throw away the idea of having to shoot a certain way for it to end up as a real film."

Kinji Fukasaku "I am fully aware that there is a generation gap between where I stand and where those kids stand."

Kiyoshi Kurosawa "If you only make one film a year in Japan, it's very difficult to stay alive."

Makoto Shinozaki "In a way film may be the most limiting medium of all."