Probably the biggest difference— the thing that really took my life an — Russell Crowe

"Its really hard to explain, because its a fucking prick of a job, you know? Particularly when you get successful with it.... People dont understand why your life suddenly changed when, hey, to them its fucking ten bucks at the movies, its over in a couple of hours. They dont understand the prep, they dont understand the real physical shit that you put yourself through. I mean, the last movies an example— shoulder surgery partway through preparation. And its a $100 million train, man, and Im the fucking guy that drives the train. And Ive got to get back on that train and make sure that this thing is completed."

"Some things just come without any real understanding. I dont bother to question it or myself anymore. If you get into a situation like L.A. Confidential, where you can just totally get inside the character, thats a privileged position. Now that Im more aware of the process I realize its the position you always want to aim for."

"People accuse me of being arrogant all the time. Im not arrogant, Im focused. I dont make demands. I dont tell you how it should be. Ill give you fucking options, and its up to you to select or throw em away. That should be the headline: If youre insecure, dont fucking call."

"I get a very deep sense that the generation after Generation X is a very conservative generation, and Im not sure they understand the commitment part of what I do. Im not sure if well ever be able to regain that ground.... I quite often feel like Im the youngest of the old guys, where Ive got some really old-fashioned philosophies about whats credible and whats not.... Suddenly, someone like me seems like a dinosaur from a different age, but I hope its the opposite of that. I hope Im at the forefront of thinking and itll all come back to that at some point."

"Ive always had a thing about being accused of something when Im not guilty of it, you know? That goes right back to a primary school thing. Its the thing that scares me the most— being blamed for something that I didnt do... And theres that "If you get accused of something and you get angry, then you must be guilty."

"Im fundamentally quite shy, so that thing of taking on another character is quite a liberating thing to do if youre a shy person, because within that character framework you can now go to all these other places. [pauses] And I never found another job that I was actually that good at."

"Be the change that you wish to see in the world."

"we are engaged in a grim experiment never before attempted. We are subjecting whole populations to exposure to chemicals which animal experiments have proved to be extremely poisonous and in many cases cumulative in their effect. These exposures now begin at or before birth and-unless we change our methods-will continue through the lifetime of those now living. No one knows what the result will be, because we have no previous experience to guide us."

"pity this busy monster, manunkind, not. Progress is a comfortable disease: your victim (death and life safely beyond) plays with the bigness of his littleness"

"I believe that the unity of man as opposed to other living things derives from the fact that man is the conscious life of himself. Man is conscious of himself, of his future, which is death, of his smallness, of his impotence; he is aware of others as others; man is in nature, subject to its laws even if he transcends it with his thought."

"“We need brains, is the bottom line,” Ivy said. “We’re not hunter-gatherers anymore. We’re all living like patients in the intensive care unit of a hospital. What keeps us alive isn’t bravery, or athleticism, or any of those other skills that were valuable in a caveman society. It’s our ability to master complex technological skills. It is our ability to be nerds. We need to breed nerds.”"

"I have been clinically depressed for most of my life. I once used drugs to fix it. Then I stopped. I stopped because I decided they were making me stupid, and Id rather be miserable than stupid. I am what I am."