Quotes from Julia Leigh

All this talk about writing is a little bit moot, because it is almost an unthinking process. It is actually a paradox because you are constantly making choices.

I don't think good films have messages.

The concentration of the elite athlete is akin perhaps to the concentration of the writer.

Work infuses my whole life. My creative life is my real life, so it's hard to separate.

I always find it extremely hard to remember the act of beginning. I almost deliberately forget it.

I, myself, don't like to see a film on Friday night and then forget it by the next day.

There is a difference between a voyeur and a tender witness. Maybe I think the audience is more of a tender witness than a voyeur, which has a shady undertone.

I love films where you go into the cinema and loosen the edges of yourself and you hopefully enter into the world of the film. You're watching something unfold before you. I prefer the idea of wonder or intense wonder over shock or something.

I think patients and doctors alike minimise the physical, emotional, and financial toll of IVF.

One of the most ephemeral and important things is atmosphere and tone and it's very hard to put your finger on what creates that.

It's dangerous to think too much about how a film will be received. Filmmaking is not a popularity contest. Some would disagree.

Although filmmaking is collaborative and involves trust, ultimately it is the director who holds the whole picture together in their head.

I wanted to transmit what it feels like to be on the so-called IVF emotional rollercoaster, and I guess I wanted to offer a shared aloneness to anyone who's desperately longed for a child.

To me the question of inspiration is an exercise in hindsight. The truth is inspiration is mysterious at the time. I don't think it's ever a rational process.

I think every single person perceives things differently. We are all singular.

I'm trying to get under people's skin in a way. I don't like films that go in one ear and out the other.

I think it's restrictive to typecast myself as a novelist because I enjoy other forms of expression. I love literature and I love cinema.

The point is the 'me' that you see before you is not the 'me' in my private little space, shape-shifting into the writing role, nor is it the 'me' that works with the actors. Here, at the end of the film doing interviews, I feel like I'm in disguise.

I became so focused on this desire to have a child that it really took over over my life, not in a positive way. It definitely impacted on my work, life, and work opportunities: I couldn't travel at particular times. I turned down a lot of opportunities, to be honest.

I've never forgotten what it's like to be in your early twenties, which is not a particularly easy time. You've left your family, you've left the strictures of high school, and you're trying to break free and form yourself but you have to support yourself as well. We don't really give enough credence to that time of life and to its troubles.

The most important thing is to have something important to say and finding the means to say it.

Although filmmaking is collaborative and involves trust, ultimately it is the director who holds the whole picture together in their head.

An IVF patient is - is living and breathing hope. It's... it's, um... it's - You wouldn't do it if you didn't have a sense of hope. Why would you put yourself through it?

We stitch together our days and edit out our nights.