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" My films are never about what Hong Kong is like, or anything approaching a realistic portrait, but what I think about Hong Kong and what I want it to be. "

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" 'Ashes of Time' was my third film, and as a young director at that point, it's not very often that you have the chance to make a big martial arts film, so of course I jumped at this opportunity. "

" The reason it takes me so long to make a film, the reason it gets so difficult, is that I'm trying to think of every film as the last one I will ever make so it can be the best it can possibly be. I don't want to have regrets or excuses or think, 'I can do better next time.' "

" My mother has a very big family in Shanghai, so I have, like, almost 40 cousins, so we stayed together all the time. So by the time I get to Hong Kong, I become the only child and the only one surrounded by adults, you know. "

" What's so great about inspiration is sometimes it finds you when you're not looking. "

" The original title for 'In the Mood for Love' was called 'A Story About Food.' The idea was to tell a love story through different courses. "

" I was born in Shanghai and moved to Hong Kong the year I was five. "

" To make a film like 'The Grandmaster,' I know I'm not going to make just a standard kung-fu film; it's not going to be just tricks or like wire works. So I spent seven years on the road interviewing different schools and a lot of real grandmasters from Chinese martial arts. "

" I am just the band leader, and I just keep everything in tune. "

" In most kung fu films, they want to create a hero who's always fighting a bad guy. In the story of Ip Man, he's not fighting physical opponents. He's fighting the ups and downs of his life. "

" I think of action as a dance. It's a riddle; it should have emotion in it. "

" I think, to be a director, sometimes you need to have certain hunches - you have to believe in some gut feeling. "

" I don't want to be a grumpy old man or too pessimistic, because if I have a chance, I would prefer to watch a film in the cinema with an audience on a big screen instead of watching it on a cell phone. It's a very different experience, but somehow I think this form will have its own future and life. "

" The laboratory where we stored all our negatives went bankrupt overnight following the Asian economic crisis in 1997. So, on short notice, we had to retrieve all the materials in the middle of the night before the debtor-receiver took over the laboratory the next morning. "

" I started out my career as a screenwriter and quickly discovered that adhering to a script isn't always the best way to make a film. You have to take into consideration the nuances of the characters and what the actors bring to their roles. "

" During shooting, you have the idea, like, of this certain dress on this actress, but it's not to fit, so you have to make all of these alterations and modifications. So in a way, I build the characters with the cast, and it's sort of custom-made, the whole process, and then you have to make all of these adjustments. "

" The industry and support in China has really matured because there are so many productions there. At the same time, there's been a lot of changes in the market, which I think also has enabled productions like 'The Grandmaster' to happen and to be possible to shoot in China. "

" I have an image of Shanghai, which is quite different from other directors, I think. The story of Shanghai should happen in back alleys. "

" Ip Man was an extraordinary man who lived during extraordinary times. He was born to a rich family when the country was still a monarchy and lived through various civil wars, revolutions, the Japanese invasion, and the establishment of the Republic. "

" Sometimes, when you're on the streets, certain music inspires you, and then you have a vision. But, at the end of the day, it's a synthesis of visions, so you have to think, as a director, of a scene, or how to deliver a line, or how do this visually. "

" When I look at 'Fallen Angels,' I realize it is not a film that is truly about Hong Kong. It's more like my Hong Kong fantasy. I want Hong Kong to be quiet, with less people. "

" Heritage is something martial-arts films don't often talk about. "

" It used to be when you eat, you eat with people. But instant noodles are so instant that people eat by themselves. And it's a very convenient way of eating but also a very lonely way of eating. "

" Sometimes, we have to turn our camera to a mirror to shoot something, and people think, 'Oh, that's very stylish.' Yes it is, but at the same time, we did it because we are shooting in a very small space, and that was our only option. "

" I've always wanted to make a film about the Tong Wars, the rioting and the crime factions in San Francisco's Chinatown in the early part of the last century. "

" 1936 is a very important year: a golden time for martial arts, right before the Japanese invasion. "

" In much the same way Ip Man embodied the struggles of the Chinese people, I wanted Gong Er to represent the changing role of women. "

" At film festivals, I put on my sunglasses and go to sleep because I don't want to see my films again. "

" One's memories aren't what actually happened - they're very subjective. You can always make it much better, right? "

" I sometimes compare making a film to cooking. Some dishes need to be stewed, while others need to be fried. "

" The Chinese government promised Hong Kong '50 years, and change.' And 50 years later, after 1997, will be 2046; I think, 'Well, that's a very interesting promise.' So I want to make a film about promise. "