Quotes

I never really like the characters I play. I only come to love them afterwards.

The relationship between an actor and a director is like a love story between a man and a woman. I'm sure sometimes I'm the woman.

I'm happy with very little on this earth, but I do like to have a lot in my glass. [on his love for wine]

I want to get more involved with the vineyards I have all over the world and to spend more time with the people who work in them. You need to be there to make yourself understood; you can't just tell people what to do from the end of a telephone line. My unrealized ambition is to tend my vines, produce wine and work like an artisan. I dream of rediscovering the old traditions and customs of wine growing, not necessarily to deny the technology which we have today, but to harness it and work in harmony with nature.

Authenticity is the ability to listen to what nature tells us. Listening isn't the same thing as never making a mistake, but the important thing is to learn.

I'd rather spend my time with grape growers than actors. In the film industry, all the money is focused on television and the stupidity of American cinema. There are fewer and fewer "films d'auteur" made by people like Ken Loach or Claude Chabrol. The cinema is dead; it's finished. Who goes to the movies now? It's children. People who are 30 would rather sit at home in front of the telly.

Cooking is not difficult. Everyone has taste, even if they don't realize it. Even if you're not a great chef, there's nothing to stop you understanding the difference between what tastes good and what doesn't. That's what's so terrible about the industrialization of agriculture and the food chain. There are children growing up today who don't know what a lamb, a pig or a rabbit looks like.

I'm about to stop filming! I'm a guy that is leaving. And for once, I'm not drunk! I've got nothing to lose. I did 170 films, and I've got nothing else to prove. I'm not going to keep up like this for ever. I finish in style with film director Thomas Gilou, who has made lots of successes, and has made a really good film with this Michou d'Auber (2007). I retire in style with this film. It's wonderful.

I don't care about Hollywood films. Hollywood films were very good before, in the 1950s. Now you see the English filmmakers are the best. Ridley Scott who did Gladiator (2000)...American Beauty (1999), the Oscar winner, came from London. Hollywood exists only for the B-movies. The best things are coming from Europe. We have all the talent here but we need American money!

When I'm stressed, I still drink five or six bottles of wine a day. When I'm relaxed, three or four, but I'm trying to cut down. You think alcohol calms you down, but you become addicted to it. [2005]

[on Juliette Binoche] Please can you explain to me what the secret of this actress is meant to be? I would really like to know why she has been so esteemed for so many years. She has nothing. Absolutely nothing! She is nothing. Compared with her, Isabelle Adjani is great even is she's totally nuts. Or Fanny Ardant - she is magnificent, extremely impressive. But Binoche? What has she ever had going for her? [2010]

[on The Lovers on the Bridge (1991)] Leos Carax needed six years to shoot his film with Juliette Binoche, which turned out to be not even a film but just a piece of shit.

I had wonderful companions during my life, and afterwards we separated - but not like enemies. We stayed friends. It was always a costly thing to get a divorce, for example, but it's just money. It's not important. I had children with really wonderful women. I still like them. I think we can learn everything from women. And I especially learnt from women who have been my lovers or my mistresses. But I also learnt a lot from female writers, like Virginia Woolf and Anaïs Nin. I prefer them to, say, Hemingway, and I would always prefer them. Although I very much like F. Scott Fitzgerald, I would prefer Colette, for example. Because we can learn from them. Also because these women are born mothers. They live as mothers. And they often wait; they wait for something in their life, especially if they're strong women. And these are the human beings that make me patient, make me want to wait and accept inertia.

It's the people you work with that matter. It's not the role. I don't give a shit about the role. I don't have any ambition or career plans. I never have. I'm living in the present. I have no ambition. It's true. But I want to live. I'm curious about people. That's what I've always done since I've been a small boy. I'm curious about others. I do this profession. I'm an actor. And it is, for me, a opportunity to meet people. One of the advantages of my profession is I come into contact with many people. [2011]

I'm not a monster, I'm just a man who wants to pee.

As soon as I had enough money, I bought a plane so I could go wherever I wanted. True luxury is to be free. It's not to carry a Vuitton handbag. What would I do with a Vuitton bag? I'd have a crap in it. My freedom has no price. I don't want to be waiting for the person in from of me to move. Luxury is to depend on no one but yourself.

I killed two lions once, and I understand why the lion is the king of the jungle. In legitimate self-defense. Imagine you're driving and your engine breaks down. You got out, and in your way are these animals. So you shoot, just to scare them. They don't move. I wasn't there for hunting. I was in Africa for Africa.

France is likely to become a Disneyland for foreigners, populated by imbeciles making wine and stinky cheese for tourists. There is no more freedom, people are being manipulated.

There is a world of entertainment and people, terrorized by the Americans, don't know any more which language to speak. There are 10 stars and they are all American. Their films are crammed with special effects and the rest of the world of cinema is struggling to exist.

Half of Europe - with its fear of migrants - that has become a bit fascist.

When I'm bored, I drink. Apart from compulsory moments of abstinence. After bypass surgery, and also because of cholesterol and stuff, I have to be careful. Anyway, I'm not going to die. Not now. I still have energy. But if ever I start drinking I can't drink like a normal person. I can absorb 12, 13, 14 bottles per day. I was asked to tell the doctor about my consumption. So I said, 'here it goes'. It starts at home with champagne or red wine, before 10am. Then again champagne. Then pastis, maybe half a bottle. Then food, accompanied by two bottles of wine. In the afternoon, champagne, beer, and more pastis at around 5pm, to finish off the bottle. Later on vodka and/or whisky.

[on being granted his Russian passport in 2013] I am very happy, it's very beautiful here. Beautiful and soulful people live here.