I Don't Look At Scripts. I Just

Don't Get Seduced By Your Own Stuff. Don't Get High On Your Own Supply. The Hardest Thing As A Filmmaker Is When You're Watching A Film That You've Worked On For Several Years. You Know Every Frame So Intimately That Holding Lots Of The Objectivity Of A New Viewer Who Has Just Seen It For The First Time Is The Hardest Thing. Every Aesthetic Decision You Make - And You Make Thousands Of Them Every Day, Have To - In Theory, Must Be Done From You Being A Blank Slate. You Almost Have To Run A Program, Like A Mind Wipe, Every Time You Watch The Movie.

Pick Up A Camera. Shoot Something. No Matter How Small, No Matter How Cheesy, No Matter Whether Your Friends And Your Sister Star In It. Put Your Name On It As Director. Now You're A Director. Everything After That You're Just Negotiating Your Budget And Your Fee.

With 'avatar,' I Thought, Forget All These Chick Flicks And Do A Classic Guys' Adventure Movie, Something In The Edgar Rice Burroughs Mold, Like John Carter Of Mars - A Soldier Goes To Mars.

Hope Is Not A Strategy. Luck Is Not A Factor. Fear Is Not An Option.

I'm Willing To Engage Or Indulge Real Ideas, But If We Don't Do Something [about Global Warming], We're All Going To Die! What's It Going To Take, A Big F--ing Disaster With All Kinds Of People Dying? We Need To Change Our Priorities Fast.