Mathieu Amalric

Being an actor only came about because Arnaud Desplechin, the guy who did 'Kings and Queen', had this curious idea to think that I could be an actor, but I had never acted before, and I was supposed to direct my own film!

If you love movies, then you love America.

There is the melancholy of Europe. There is the romantic malaise. Feeling sad is almost a form of deepness.

I'm always intrigued when you are travelling through a place and there is somebody who has lived there and done the same job for years.

Acting is about animality. It's great to be allowed to be animal. But I feel more alive as a director. Every morning, I have to write.

The body is something absolutely miraculous. It's amazing, the five senses.

I keep meeting directors that are so irresistible. I only do irresistible films, because I don't need to act to feel myself alive.

My life as an actor has submerged me completely because I don't know why.

Sometimes with anger you can be much more dangerous than with skill.

I first started working in film when I was 17. I was a director's assistant, an editor.

Arnaud Desplechin invented me as an actor. I never imagined I'd be acting in movies.

If you approach Cannes with a sense of humor, nothing is that bad. You have to take it for what it is; otherwise, it's silly.

Cannes is a circus, so you have to have fun with it. Everything suddenly becomes funny. And the promotion of a movie - that's where you really need to be a good actor. You need to make journalists believe that what you're saying is just for them and you've never said it before, even when you're talking about the same film over and over again.

I don't want to be a star!