Sad will be the day for any man when he becomes contented with the thoughts he is thinking and the deeds he is doing - where there is not forever beating at the doors of his soul some great desire to do something larger which he knows he was meant and made to do.

I was raised in an atmosphere of 'everything's fine.' But as I got older I was like 'Well no everything's not fine. There is stuff that's sad.' I am a really sensitive person. I think I am too sensitive sometimes.

I've cried and you'd think I'd be better for it but the sadness just sleeps and it stays in my spine the rest of my life.

I seldom think about my limitations and they never make me sad. Perhaps there is just a touch of yearning at times but it is vague like a breeze among flowers.

I think one of the downsides of the sort of obsession with romantic love and personal fulfillment is that the plain fact of the matter is that those feelings don't last for ever and so they better be replaced and reinforced by things that do.

People say the 'Lost Generation' in a romantic sense but I think it was tragic. They were really lost.

There were two sides to David Lean: on the one side he was kind of a rather stiff disciplined Englishman. And then he had this kind of romantic side to him. I think being true to both sides of your nature is important.

In the West audiences think I am a stereotyped action star or that I always play hitmen or killers. But in Hong Kong I did a lot of comedy many dramatic films and most of all romantic roles lots of love stories. I was like a romance novel hero.

I know it's hard to blame the time but there's a bit of an expectation for a summer movie. I think that 'Superman Returns' was a bit nostalgic and romantic and I don't think that was what people were expecting especially in the summer.

I think Bond the character is distinct: He's British he has a certain code that he lives by he's incorruptible... he's a classical hero but he's also fallible. He has inner demons inner conflicts and he's a romantic.

Although some people think I am a romantic novelist I have always thought of myself as a rather gritty radical historian.

I love romantic comedy but I think you have to have another idea that you're chasing along with romantic comedy.

I think Bach is equally a romantic composer because he laid the seeds harmonically for people like Chopin and the great Romantics Brahms so it's difficult to you know all this like labelling and putting - I think Bach is attractive to musicians because he supersedes the labels.

I try to speak of a love that not necessarily romantic. I think there is so much love between people and so much love people want to give but it's harder and harder these days to show that to celebrate that you know?

I think in a lot of romantic comedies it ends with a kiss and I feel like in modern day relationships and maybe just my own experience it starts with a kiss and then all sort of falls apart and then comes together. You're texting. You're wondering what's going on. There's no definitions there's no labels.

There are so many different reasons as to why I love riding trains. But I think ultimately it's the romantic feeling of it. There's something about it that just transports me into old films.

You won't find me in a romantic comedy. Those movies don't speak to me. People don't come to talk to me about those scripts because they probably think I'm this dark twisted miserable person.

Well we all start thinking we're going to be Romantic rock stars but then reality hits and you realize no one reads you but other poets.

I have never been so calculating as to sing some Barry White song to get a girl. But I do think it's very romantic to cook dinner and sit around the piano at night and sing together.

When I read the script I liked the script very much and I thought it was a marvelous part for her because I think it is a change of pace. I mean we know how wonderful she is in romantic comedy.

I don't think I'll ever escape the fact that I don't belong anywhere in particular. I've often dreamed about going back to Nigeria but that's a very romantic notion. It's a hideous country to go to in reality.

Mind you Roman Holiday - which is kind of a romantic comedy - is one of my favorite films and I think Audrey Hepburn is absolutely phenomenal in that movie.

The romantic idea is that everybody around a writer must suffer for his talent. I think a writer is a citizen of humanity part of his nation part of his family. He may have to make some compromises.

I've never felt that I had to take a role in one of those mediocre but hugely budgeted romantic comedies because I want to wear beautiful dresses and have people think I'm pretty and that I get the guy.