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I Call Iran Home Because No Matter How Long I Live In France, And Despite The Fact That I Feel Also French After All These Years, To Me The Word 'home' Has Only One Meaning: Iran. I Suppose It's That Way For Everyone: Home Is The Place Where One Is Born And Raised.

-Marjane Satrapi

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I Call Iran Home

Marjane Satrapi

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I Call Iran Home Because No Matter How Long I Live In France, And Despite The Fact That I Feel Also French After All These Years, To Me The Word 'home' Has Only One Meaning: Iran. I Suppose It's That Way For Everyone: Home Is The Place Where One Is Born And Raised.

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But Violence Is News, To A Certain Extent, And People Don't Want Complicated News. Because As Soon As You Realize Things Are Complicated, Your Life Becomes More Complicated.

I Hate This Word 'graphic Novel.' It Is A Term Publishing Houses Have Created For The Bourgeois So They Wouldn't Be Ashamed Of Buying Comics... I'm Not A Graphic Novelist. I Am A Cartoonist And I Make Comics And I Am Very Happy About It.

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It's True That, In Iran, Women Have Half Of The Rights Men Do. And Yet 66 Per Cent Of Students Are Women.

I Think The Best Work Of The Director Is To Listen To What All The Technicians Around Him Have To Say, But Then The Thing Is To Take The Best Decision, What You Think Is The Best. Then, That Is The Moment Where You Have To Have All The Film In Your Head And Imagine How All Of That Will Fit Together.

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In All The Dictatorships, There's Such A Non-understanding Of What Human Beings Are. I Mean, If You Believe In The Bible, You Have The Story Of Adam And Eve And God Tells Them, "do Whatever You Want. The Only Thing You Shouldn't Do Is Eat The Apple." What Do They Do The First Thing? They Eat The Apple. So If You Know A Little Bit The Psychology Of Human Beings, You Have To Understand That If You Say Something You Should Not Do, Then Everybody Wants To Do It.

People, They Think That Animation Is A Style. Animation Is Just A Technique. It's Like, People, They Think That Comics Is A Style, Like Comics Is A Superhero Story. Comic Is Just A Narration, And Is A Medium, You Can Say Any Kind Of Story In Comics And You Can Say Of Any Kind Of Story In Animation.

I Don't Believe In The Clash Of Cultures. The Culture Is One. The Culture Is A Ring Off The Same Chain. Picasso Was Very Much Influenced By The African Arts, And He Influenced A Whole Other Generation Of Artists. So Everything Influences Everything.

I Don't Make A Career Plan. I Take Things The Way They Come.

Comics Are Just Another Medium To Express Yourself. It's Not Cinema; It's Not Literature; It's Just Something Else. It Has A Specific Requirement, Which Is That Images Are Used To Tell The Story. There Are Lots Of Crappy Movies, With Guns And Action And Arnold Schwarzenegger Or Whatever.

You Never Have These Moments That, You Know, Are Always Perfect. Always Something Happens.

If It's A Good Work Of Adaptation, The Book Should Remain A Book And The Film Should Remain A Film, And You Should Not Necessarily Read The Book To See The Film. If You Do Need That, Then That Means That It's A Failure. That Is What I Think.

You Know, The Cynicism That Is In The Politics, It Is Not For My Soul. It Makes Me - Out Of Me, An Extremely Bitter, Cynical Person That I Hate To See In The Mirror, Really.

I Had So Many Professions Before. I Didn't Want To Do This Particularly. It Just Happened.

This Clash Of The Culture, East And The West, Us And Them, Muslim And Christian, Does Not Exist.

I Think Animation Is Like Running A Marathon, And Making A Movie Is Like A 100 Meter Sprint. The Question Is: Are You A Marathon Man Or Are You A Sprinter? I Realized That I Was More Of A Sprinter Than A Marathon Man. With A Long, Long Project, I Get Bored Easily.

We Found Ourselves Veiled And Separated From Our Friends.

To Tell You The Truth, I Never Wanted To Become A Moviemaker. It Was Like I Was A Cinepihile, And I Go, Like, Three Or Four Times Per Week To The Cinema, And I Like To Watch Films.

I Like To Be Sad Once In A While. You Need It For Your Equilibrium.

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There Are Things That I Love In Iranian Cinema And Things That I Don't. In Iranian Cinema, You Have To Use Metaphor Because You Are Living Under A Dictatorship.

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The First Writing Of The Human Being Was Drawing, Not Writing.

Drawing Is The First Language Of The Human Being Before Writing. It's A Transcription Of How The Human Being Sees Reality, Not Reality Itself.

Fear Has Always Been The Driving Force Behind All Dictators' Repression.

I Wanted To Do My Artistic Work, And In Iran You Have Censorship. It Was Difficult For Me To Do The Work I Wanted To Do.

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I Like Making Comics And Animation Because It Takes Such A Long Time. I'm Not A Runner Of The 100 Meter. I Like Marathons. The Longer It Takes, The Better I Feel.

Here [in The Usa], You Have The Best Laws For Freedom Of Expression. The Problem Is That Expression Can Be Bought By People Who Don't Want You Have It. Apparently, True Patriotism Destroys Freedom Of Expression.

I Had Two Major Activities As A Child. I Was Trying To Put On Shows With Kids In My Street, Or I Was Drawing. Actually, What I'm Doing Now Is Exactly What I Was Doing Then. Either I'm Drawing, Or I'm Gathering People For A Common Project. The Only Difference Is That Now They Are Paying Me For That.

I Realized Then That I Didn't Understand Anything. I Read All The Books I Could.

I Don't Want To Quit Smoking. I Am Convinced That If I Quit Smoking, The World Would Go To Hell.

Culture And Education Are The Lethal Weapons Against All Kinds Of Fundamentalism.

It's Fear That Makes Us Lose Our Conscience. It's Also What Transforms Us Into Cowards.

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For Me, Drawing Is A Question Of Death And Life. Every Day I Draw, I Write, I Do Something.

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Politicians Think They Have Answers For Everything. We Artists, We Only Have Questions.

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Black And White

You Draw The Character From All Angles - Side, Profile, Back, Etc. So The Animator Has This Character In All The Ways It Looks Like.

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The Real War Is Not Between The West And The East. The Real War Is Between Intelligent And Stupid People.

I Had Learned That You Should Always Shout Louder Than Your Aggressor.

You See A Picture And You Understand Perfectly, Immediately, The Basic Thing That's Happening. It's Probably More Accessible Because We Are In A Culture Of Images. People Are Used To Seeing Stories That Way. They Understand Looking At Pictures.

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You Have To Be Narcissistic To Be An Artist. You Have To Think You Are The Centre Of The Whole Thing Otherwise Why Do You Create? The Only Thing Is To Recognise It, And Then You Make The Best Of It.

My Real Background Was In Art Studies. At The Beginning I Was A Painter, Then I Was This Graphic Designer, Then I Became An Illustrator, Then I Was A Comic Artist. But For Me It's A Different Way Of Expression, A Different Field Of Art. They're Not Separated; Everything For Me Is Related.

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I'm Not A Religious Person At All.

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I Became The Voice Of A Generation In A Very Surprising Way, Because Many Iranians Recognize Themselves In It. But That Is Not What I Wanted.

It's Cinematographic To Smoke. Imagine Lauren Bacall Without A Cigarette.

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If You're Not [federico] Fellini You Might Make Something Very Vulgar. Animation Made It Possible To Maintain Unity With All These Different Narratives.

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In Every Religion, You Find The Same Extremists.

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A Real Love Story Has To Finish Bad. That Is What I Think.

I Had This Fantasy That In A Democracy The Government Was The Population. So I Came To America And Got A Big Slap In My Face... Americans Were Not What I Thought. I Thought I Was Going To See Bastards And I Saw Nice People, Very Friendly To Me.

You Are Putting Yourself In Serious Danger...' I Think That I Preferred To Put Myself In Serious Danger Rather Than Confront My Shame. My Shame At Not Having Become Someone, The Shame Of Not Having Made My Parents Proud After All The Sacrifices They Had Made For Me. The Shame Of Having Become A Mediocre Nihilist.

I Chose The Actors That I Was In Love With. I Cannot Work With People That I Don't Personally Like A Lot. They Can Be The Best Actor In The World, But If The First Contact Is Not Good, If I Don't Fall In Love With Them, Then I Don't Want To Work With Them. It's Impossible.

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I Really Didn't Know What To Think About The Veil. Deep Down I Was Very Religious But As A Family We Were Very Modern And Avant-garde. I Was Born With Religion. At The Age Of Six I Was Already Sure I Was The Last Prophet. This Was Few Years Before The Revolution.

I Don't Consider Myself As A Feminist But More A Humanist.

When You Say 'revolution' When You Have Only Men Outside, You Know That Something Is Going Wrong. I'm Not Like A Hardcore Feminist, But I Think That One Of The Things That Makes The Society Advanced Is Equality Between Men And Women. If Half Of The Society Is Oppressed By The Other Half, It's Not Fine.

For Me George Bush Is Just As Scary, If Not More. Because He Doesn't Look Like A Scary Guy, Because He's Shaved And He Has A Tie On. But He's A Real Fanatic - A Fanatic By Definition Is The One Who Says, If You Are Not With Me, You Are Against Me, And That's Exactly The Position He Takes. The Mullahs In My Country, It's Obvious. But A Guy Who Says I Am The President Of The Biggest Secular Democracy In The World And Asks People To Read The Bible And Make Crusades And Says He's God's Best Friend - This Guy Is Even More Scary Because You Don't See It At The Beginning.

I Was A Westerner In Iran, An Iranian In The West. I Had No Identity. I Didn't Even Know Anymore Why I Was Living.

Of Course, When You Remember Your Life, You Never Remember Anything In A Chronological Way. You Always Have Pieces Of Memories, And Some Of These Memories Are Full Of Details And Very Colorful. Some Of Them You Just See The Action And It's Completely Blank.

The Things That I Do Today Are The Things I Did As A Child. When I Was A Child, Either I Was Drawing Or I Was Taking All The Kids Off My Street And I Wanted To Make Shows - I Was All The Time Making! The Only Thing Is, Now I Know How To Do It Better, And Now They Give Me Money For It.

I Am Very Bad At Computers. I Don't Really Know How To Write Email.

I Try To Look At Life Carefully And Reproduce Life The Way Life Is. It's A Question Of Looking Carefully At How It Is. In Life, You Don't Have Total Happiness. People Always Say That. But You Don't Have Total Sadness Either, No Matter What Situation You Are Living In.

One Can Forgive But One Should Never Forget.

We Always Say We Are Equal In Front Of Death, But When You Are Rich, For Example, And You Have Everybody Taking Care Of You, I Think That You Suffer Much Less. It Must Be Much More Painful To Die When You Are Poor Than When You Are Rich. But When Your Heart Is Broken, You Can Be Rich, Poor, Whatever - A Broken Heart, We Are All Equal In Front Of It. And I Think There Is No Subject More Serious.

Human Beings Have A Lot Of Problems Identifying Themselves With Other Human Beings Who Don't Resemble Them Exactly. But There's Something About Drawing That Means That Anyone Can Identify To A Drawing. I Mean, People Can Identify Themselves With Donald Duck And Mickey Mouse.

Anything That Has A Relationship With Pleasure We Reject It. Eating, They Talk About Cholesterol; Making Love, They Talk About Aids; You Talk About Smoking, They Talk About Cancer. It's A Very Sick Society That Rejects Pleasure.

Words Also Are Filters. They Have To Be Translated. Even In The Original Language, There Is Interpretation And Some Ambiguity. If There's A Cultural Difference Between The Writer And The Reader, That Might Come Out In Words. But With Pictures, There's More Efficiency.

It Is Dangerous When You Start Calling People From One Part Of The World Terrorists Or Fanatic, And You Reduce Them To Some Abstract Notion. If Evil Has A Geographical Place, And If The Evil Has A Name, That Is The Beginning Of Fascism. Real Life Is Not This Way. You Have Fanatics And Narrow-minded People Everywhere.

I Don't Think Of Myself As A Rebel; I Just Say What I Think.

If You Have A Little Sensibility Or A Heart, You Have All The Reason To Be Depressed Once In A While. But The Depression Is Like A Motor For Creation. I Need A Little Bit Of Depression, A Bit Of Acid In My Stomach, To Be Able To Create. When I'm Happy, I Just Want To Dance.

To Speak Behind Others' Backs Is The Ventilator Of The Heart.

You Know, They Say In France That Translation Is Like A Woman: She Is Either Beautiful Or Faithful.

In A Place Like Israel, They're Very Concerned With Iran, So There's A Lot Of Interest. So They Want To See What This Iranian From France Has To Say In Her Comics. I Guess That's Good. My The Books Are Coming Out In Other Countries. And Each Time, They Discover Something Different To Be Interested In.

People Are So Afraid To Say The Word "comic". It Makes You Think Of A Grown Man With Pimples, A Ponytail And A Big Belly. Change It To "graphic Novel" And That Disappears.

The Germans Sell Chemical Weapons To Iran And Iraq. The Wounded Are Then Sent To Germany To Be Treated. Veritable Human Guinea Pigs.

When You Make A Book Or You Make A Movie, It Is Almost Like Hitting On Somebody. It's Not Because You Want To Seduce People That You Will Seduce Them; You Can Hit On Somebody And It Doesn't Work. But When You Hit On Them And It Works, Then It's Really Cool.

Imagine If I Cannot Stand Someone And Every Day He Is Here In My Face, Then I Cannot Work. Then, The Whole Time, I Am Thinking "i Hate Him, I Hate Him." But If I Love Him Or I Love Her, Then I Can Do Anything, Then I Am Comfortable. That's Why It's So Important To Be Surrounded By People That You Really Like.

I Have Been Brought Up Open-minded. If I Didn't Know Any People From Other Countries, I'd Think Everyone Was Evil Based On News Stories. But I Know A Lot Of People, And Know That There Is No Such Thing As Stark Good And Evil. Isn't It Possible There Is The Same Amount Of Evil Everywhere?

I Am Absolutely Not A Feminist, I Am Against Stupidity, And If It Comes From Males Or Females, It Doesn't Change Anything. If It Means That Women And Men, They Are Equal, Then Ok, Certainly I Am A Feminist.

As A Director, You Have To Understand What Is Happening - If I Don't Understand It, You Can't Make Changes.

I Call Iran Home Because No Matter How Long I Live In France, And Despite The Fact That I Feel Also French After All These Years, To Me The Word 'home' Has Only One Meaning: Iran. I Suppose It's That Way For Everyone: Home Is The Place Where One Is Born And Raised.

I'm Extremely Unbearable. You Know, I'm Narcissistic And At The Same Time I'm Very Charming - I Think.

War Always Takes You By Surprise.

You Cannot Be Completely Nice. It's Impossible. Who Is It? Who Is The Perfect Guy? Show Him To Me! It Doesn't Exist. And Thank God.

I Have My Dark Side. You Have Your Dark Side. From The Second That We Have A Brain, There Are Things That Are Not Right - We Are Human Beings With All These Illusions And Complexes And Everything. That's Attractive To Me.

Adaptation Of Books Is Never A Success. When The Author Wants To Make It, It's Even Worse.

All Big Changes Of The World Come From Words.

I'm Not Somebody That Keeps The Thing In Her Heart. I Can Get Very Angry For Five Minutes, But Then It's Finished. Once I've Yelled, It's Over.

I Was In Love With Darth Vader. He Was Extremely Sexy To Me. Once I Had Almost A Sexual Dream About Darth Vader. At The Moment He Was About To Pull His Helmet Off, My Husband Woke Me Up And I Was So Annoyed. I Told Him, "i Was On My Way To Kiss Darth Vader."

Racism Is Not Nearly As Important As Poverty. That's The Same Around The World. What Look Like Ethnic Problems Are Really Economic Issues. If You Look Closely At All These Conflicts Around The World, They Come Down To Poverty And Economics And Resources. The More Poverty, The Worse The War.

The Best Thing I Ever Did In My Life Was To Ask, 'do I Like Everybody?' And The Answer Was, 'no.' So Why Should Everybody Like Me? If People Are Against Me, So What? I'm Against Them Too.

The Movie Business Is Not About The Money. Of Course, You Need Money To Make The Movie. If You Have A Small Budget, Adapt Yourself. Having $200 Million Dollars Doesn't Ensure That You're Definitely Going To Make A Good Movie. There's So Many Examples That Prove That.

If You Know A Little Bit The Psychology Of Human Beings, You Have To Understand That If You Say Something You Should Not Do, Then Everybody Wants To Do It.

That's The Story Of Life - When You Start Enjoying People, It's Always Too Late.

Today, We Don't Talk About History. The Past Is Two Weeks Ago, And The Future Is Two Weeks After.

I Like To Make Mechanical Stuff. Once I Make A Film I Have To Do Whatever I Can Make Onstage I Make It Onstage.

The Regime Had Understood That One Person Leaving Her House While Asking Herself: Are My Trousers Long Enough?' Is My Veil In Place?' Can My Make-up Be Seen?' Are They Going To Whip Me?' No Longer Asks Herself: Where Is My Freedom Of Thought?' Where Is My Freedom Of Speech?' My Life, Is It Livable?' What's Going On In The Political Prisons?

I'm Someone Who Lived In A War For Five Years. I Received Bombs On My Head Every Day Of My Childhood. Did That Stop Me From Living? Did That Stop Me From Laughing?

The Information I Have About Iran Is Second Hand.

Image Is An International Language.

International Language

Not Everybody Loves Their Children. If That Was A Fact, All The Children Would Be Happy And They Would Make Happy Adults. Instead, We Have Lots Of Miserable Children That Later Became Miserable Adults. This Is A Fact. We Cannot Change That.

I Wanted To Make A Real Love Story With A Bad Ending, Because A Love Story That Ends Good Is The Life Of Everyone - You And I, For Example. I Always Say To People, You Know, If Romeo And Juliet Got Married, Nobody Would Care About Them. Imagine Romeo And Juliet, Six Kids Yelling, Mama, Mama, Papa, Papa.

Graphic Novels Are Not Traditional Literature, But That Does Not Mean They Are Second-rate. Images Are A Way Of Writing. When You Have The Talent To Be Able To Write And To Draw, It Seems A Shame To Choose One. I Think It's Better To Do Both.

My Mother Was The Favorite Child Of Her Parents. My Father Was The Favorite Child Of His Parents. The Result Of These Two Favorite Children Was Me. And I Am An Only Child. So I Was Convinced That I Was The Center Of The Universe.

Revolutions Just Spread Blood. Evolution - This Is Something That Changes In The Long Term.

Here's The Problem: The Description Of The World Is Always Reduced To Yes Or No, Black Or White. Superficial Stories. Superhero Stories. One Side Is The Good One. The Other One Is Evil.

I Respect Humanity. That's My Religion. I Can't Stand These Religions That Are Really Businesses. So Much Money Everywhere That's Going To Buy A Really Nice House In Heaven - Or What? I Don't Get It.

I Love The French For Their Sarcasm, Their Irony. I Love Them For Their Bad Moods.

For Me, Who Loves To Draw And Who Loves To Write And Cannot Choose Between One Or The Other, The Comic Is The Best Form.

The Most Natural Thing For Us Is Drawing. The Characters [in Persepolis] Are Hand Drawn. We're Not Technical People. We Don't Know How To Type.

A Well-trained Cat Doesn't Exist Because A Cat Remains A Cat.

Hunger Eats Civilization. The West Is Not Hungry; That's Why They Can Say They're So Civilized. Civilization Is The Biggest Bluff!

I Wrote The Plot [for The Persepolis ]and Vincent [paronnaud] And I Wrote And Discussed The Shooting Of The Script. Vincent Then Took Care Of The Production Design, The Actual Shooting, And What Was Going On Within Each Scene. It's Very Difficult, Though, To Draw A Line Between Who Did What. Because Vincent Would Say Something, And I Would Add Something, And At The End You Have This Film, Yet No Clear Idea Of Who Did What.

If People Are Given The Chance To Experience Life In More Than One Country, They Will Hate A Little Less. It's Not A Miracle Potion, But Little By Little You Can Solve Problems In The Basement Of A Country, Not On The Surface.

If Today I Have To Make A Political Statement, It Is, 'i Love Beauty.' I Think Beauty Makes People Better.

I'm Not A Politician. I Don't Know How To Solve The Problems Of The World. But As An Artist, I Have One Duty: To Ask Questions.

I'd Heard So Many Stupidities About My Country Since I Left Iran. People Had Watched This Stupid Movie Not Without My Daughter [in Which Sally Field Plays An American Who Rescues Her Daughter From Her Estranged In-laws In Iran]; I Heard So Many Things Like That. I Did Not Make Persepolis For Iranians. It Was My Answer To The Rest Of The World, To Say, "let Me Give You Another Point Of View."

I Took Three Years Of Karate Because Of Bruce Lee, You Know. I Was A Green Belt.

When We're Afraid, We Lose All Sense Of Analysis And Reflection. Our Fear Paralyzes Us. Besides, Fear Has Always Been The Driving Force Behind All Dictators' Repression.

Whether This Tale Be True Or False, None Can Tell, For None Were There To Witness It Themselves.

The Language In A Comic Book Or A Graphic Novel And The Cinematographic Language Are Really Not The Same Language. They Are False Brother And Sister. It's Not At All The Same.

I Don't Watch Many Comic-book Movies. But I Loved 'sin City.'

I Almost Don't Know How To Write An Email.

'the Jungle Book.' It's One Of The Best Animated Films Ever. I Saw It When I Was Small At A Cinema In Tehran.

I Never Wanted To Make A Graphic Novel. As Soon As You Become A 'writer,' You Have To Be Intelligent All The Time... I Like The Fact That I Have The Right Once In A While To Say Silly Things.

I Wasn't Made To Take Orders. My Grandmother Used To Tell Me: 'laws Are For Idiots.' She Was Right.

We Can Only Feel Sorry For Ourselves When Our Misfortunes Are Still Supportable. Once This Limit Is Crossed, The Only Way To Bear The Unbearable Is To Laugh At It.

Maybe The Biggest Problem Is That There's No Empathy. Nobody Puts Themselves In The Place Of Others. Everyone Thinks They Are The Only One To Suffer. Or That They're The Only Ones Who Like Ice Cream Or Take Their Kids On Vacation.

I Don't Like The Word 'autobiography.' I Rather Like The Term 'autofiction.' The Second You Make A Script Out Of The Story Of Your Life, It Becomes Fictional. Of Course, The Truth Is Never Far. But The Story Is Created Out Of It.

I Think That All Stories - If You Make Movies About Zombies And Aliens - It Has Always To Do With Your Personal Story. If Not Directly, It Is About Your Fears, Your Obsessions, Things Like That.

I Was A Child Who Had A Life, Who Had Hopes, And I Wished That A Bomb Would Not Fall On My Head.

Life Is Absolutely Unbearable. And We're Going To Die.

Anyway, That's How It Is! Either They Obey The Law, Or They're Expelled!! And Make Sure They Wear Their Veils Correctly..." - "if Hair Is As Stimulating As You Say, Then You Need To Shave Your Moustache!" My Father Actually Said That.

You Hear People Saying, 'oh I'm So Tired, I've Had Enough Of Cannes.' How Can You Have Enough Of Cannes? It's Just The Best Place To Be, Like A Fairytale.

A Muslim Fanatic And A Christian Fanatic, A Jewish Fanatic, A Secular Fanatic, An Atheist Fanatic, A Communist Fanatic - All Of Them Are The Same. The Thinking That, 'if You Don't Think Like Me, That If You Are Not With Me, Then You Are Against Me;' This Is Something To Condemn.

Once Again, I Arrived At My Usual Conclusion: One Must Educate Oneself.

If I Have One Message To Give To The Secular American People, It's That The World Is Not Divided Into Countries. The World Is Not Divided Between East And West. You Are American, I Am Iranian, We Don't Know Each Other, But We Talk Together And We Understand Each Other Perfectly. The Difference Between You And Your Government Is Much Bigger Than The Difference Between You And Me. And The Difference Between Me And My Government Is Much Bigger Than The Difference Between Me And You. And Our Governments Are Very Much The Same.

I Think With Pictures; I'm A Very Lousy Writer. If I Write Without Pictures, I Become This Pathetic Chick Sitting Somewhere Trying To Be Interesting.

I'm Very Open And Never Write What I'm Going To Say. Speeches Bore Everybody Else. I Have To Freestyle. Every Time, From One Program To Another, Everything Changes And I Improvise.

Life Is Complex. You Don't Have Any Person Who Is Nice From The Beginning Until The End. You Don't Always Have The Notion Of Redemption. The Bad People Don't Always Pay.

I Don't Like 'graphic Novel.' It's A Word That Publishers Created For The Bourgeois To Read Comics Without Feeling Bad. Comics Is Just A Way Of Narrating - It's Just A Media Type.

I'm A Very Individualistic Person. That Is Why I Don't Belong To Any Political Party Or Anything. I Really Believe In Justice And Freedom.

I'm Not A Very Good Financing Person. I Don't Even Know How Much Money I Have In My Bank Account. I Never Have Opened One Single Envelope From The Bank - They Freak Me Out.

Evil Is International And The Fanatic Is International And Universal. There Is No Difference Between A Muslim Fanatic, A Christian Fanatic, Even A Secular Fanatic.

I Loved Chiara Mastroianni Voice, Her Talent, Her Generosity. We Rehearsed For Two Months...she's A Workaholic And Perfectionist, Like Vincent [paronnaud] And Myself.

Well, I Would Have Much Preferred To Have Had A Normal Childhood. I Would Have Loved It If My Greatest Dilemma, At 14, Was Whether To Go To Benetton For My Pullovers. I Would Have Preferred Not To Have Cried All The Tears I Have Cried.

A Cat Can Never Be Well-trained Because They're Too Independent.

My Mother Always Told Me I Had To Do 100 Times Better Than A Man. I Had To Work Hard At Maths, And Learn Four Languages.

America Is A Very Special Place. In This Country, You Have The Best And The Worst At The Same Time. Whatever You Can Imagine.

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