Guillermo del Toro

“Power revealed is power sacrificed. The truly powerful exert their influence in ways unseen, unfelt. Some would say that a thing visible is a thing vulnerable.”

“The reason there's a 'Hellboy 2' is not because the studios were passionate about the first one; it's because the numbers made sense.”

“I had nightmares as a kid. As an adult, I have very prosaic dreams.”

“Making a film is like raising a child. You cannot raise a child to be liked by everyone. You raise a child to excel, and you teach the child to be true to his own nature. There will be people who'll dislike your child because he or she is who they are, and there will be people who'll love your child immensely for the very same reason.”

“There are two levels of vampirism: one is the regular vampire, which is just like it has always been; and then there's the super vampires, which are a new breed we've created.”

“There's nothing more political than fantasy.”

“THE THING WAS AN EXPERT IN HORROR, BUT THIS HUMAN HORROR INDEED EXCEEDED ANY OTHER POSSIBLE FATE. NOT ONLY BECAUSE IT WAS WITHOUT MERCY, BUT BECAUSE IT WAS ACTED UPON RATIONALLY AND WITHOUT COMPULSION. IT WAS A CHOICE. THE KILLING WAS UNRELATED TO THE LARGE WAR, AND IT SERVED NO OTHER PURPOSE THEN EVIL. MEN CHOSE TO DO THIS TO OTHER MEN AND INVENTED REASONS AND PLACES AND MYTHS IN ORDER TO SATISFY THEIR DESIRE IN A LOGICAL AND METHODICAL WAY.”

“The way they control a population is by pointing at somebody else - whether they're gay, Mexican, Jewish, black - and saying, 'They are different than you. They're the reason you're in the shape you're in. You're not responsible.' And when they exonerate you through vilifying and demonizing someone else, they control you.”

“For Devil's Backbone I loved it but I felt very pressured but so I was neurotic on the shoot.”

“I don't try to sanction other people's joy in monsters. I mean, I think the fact is, humor, fantasy - you know, like fear, desire or laughter - create genres of their own: comedy, melodrama, or erotic films or horror films... The boundaries cannot be defined. It's to each his own.”

“I like actors that are good with pantomime and that can transmit a lot by their presence and attitude more than through their dialogue.”

“When I was a kid, monsters made me feel that I could fit somewhere, even if it was... an imaginary place where the grotesque and the abnormal were celebrated and accepted.”

“There is a heavy Mexican Catholic streak in my movies, and a huge Mexican sense of melodrama. Everything is overwrought, and there's a sense of acceptance of the fantastic in my films, which is innately Mexican. So when people ask, 'How can you define the Mexican-ness of your films?' I go, 'How can I not?' It's all I am.”

“As a director, I design every movie to be true to itself, and damn it if they like it, and damn it if they don't.”

“The way I love monsters is a Mexican way of loving monsters, which is that I am not judgmental. The Anglo way of seeing things is that monsters are exceptional and bad, and people are good. But in my movies, creatures are taken for granted.”

“I would like to avoid dying if possible. I do like living! The worst, I think for me, though, would be a really bedridden death.”

“I started when I was eight, doing super 8 films.”

“Every movie, I complicate. I make the hard choices. I remember when I was pitching 'Pan's Labyrinth:' An anti-fascist fairy tale set in Civil War Spain, where the girl dies at the end. It's not easy.”

“To me, the thing love and cinema have in common is that they are about seeing. The greatest act of love you can give to anyone is to see them exactly as they are. That's the greatest act of love because you wash away imperfections.”

“Is it...can we...is it safe?" Tub checked the lot but he seemed unconcerned. "Coach Lawrence nabbed him for practice. We live to fight another day, soldier." "No...I mean, the thing...is it...?" Tub frowned. "The thing. Hmmm. Can you be more specific? I clutched at the bumper and raised myself to unsteady feet. I patted the truck bed, taking solace in the cake of dust. It was real; I was not caught in a nightmare. I smeared the dust with my fingers and smelled it. "If you lick that, we're no longer friends," Tub said.”