I’m not a religious person at all.
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.
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 wasn’t made to take orders. My grandmother used to tell me: ‘Laws are for idiots.’ She was right.
Life is absolutely unbearable. And we’re going to die.
Hunger eats civilization. The West is not hungry; that’s why they can say they’re so civilized. Civilization is the biggest bluff!
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’m extremely unbearable. You know, I’m narcissistic and at the same time I’m very charming – I think.
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.
You never have these moments that, you know, are always perfect. Always something happens.
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.
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.
I wanted to make a real love story with a bad ending, because a love story that ends good is the life of everyone. 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.
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.
Adaptation of books is never a success. When the author wants to make it, it’s even worse.
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.”
With animation, if something does not fit, you always have the time to change it. When you make a live-action movie, when your days of shooting are over, they are over forever.
Revolutions just spread blood. Evolution – this is something that changes in the long term. Because history is long term. But today, we don’t talk about history. The past is two weeks ago, and the future is two weeks after.
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.
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.