Quotes from Jodie Foster

I was never the ingenue or the pretty girlfriend of Tom Cruise in a movie. I didn't have that career, so I don't have to compete on that level.

I make movies about people in spiritual crisis because it's a way for me to spend the time, the energy, the focus and the obsession to come to terms with my own spiritual crisis.

My mom was always late. It drove me crazy as a child. So I'm always on time - or early.

I spent a lot of time not in school, so I didn't have deep relationships with kids my own age.

Casting is a long process for me. I take a lot of time.

It's a tough trick to be able to create an intelligent movie that has socio-political commentary, and also has the emotional and moving stuff, at the same time.

Boys are easy. I mean, there are just a lot of bruises when they're young. With boys, you get a lot of accidental jabs in the eye and stepping on your feet, and those tantrums they cause when they don't want to leave the toy store.

So, yes, there's nothing I love more than listening to directors talk about their movies.

'Silence Of The Lambs' was not something people expected me to do.

I had a certain career as an actor that I think was quite personal as well, and had a lot of integrity, but I wasn't writing my own things or directing my own movies.

I'm interested in directing movies about situations that I've lived, so they are almost a personal essay about what I've come to believe in.

I absolutely love religions and the rituals. Even though I don't believe in God, we celebrate pretty much every religion in our family with the kids.

There is nothing in this world that I am prouder of than my ability to feel, to survive and, yes, to be a fool for what I love and believe in.

I will always love psychology, and the basis of psychology is family.

I love the way L A. leaves you alone. I can go home, read all day, and nobody bugs me.

I love European movies and I kind of grew up on European films.

As I've said before, and I still hold to, I truly am the most boring person alive. And if there was a great investigation to be found at the end of the resume, it would be, the most boring person alive.

Every movie that I've had to really knock down the door for has been an enormous success for me. Not just like a financial success but a real personal success.

I don't have a burning desire to act, strangely enough. I don't know that if I hadn't been an actor as a young person, I don't know that I ever would have chosen this because it's not really my personality.

You develop a third eye where you kind of know where they are in a room at all times but no matter how vigilant you are as a parent, at some point, you'll look around a room and can't find them and there's a searing pain that goes through your body.

Everybody reads for me. I was never weird about that. I never minded coming in and reading. They should know if I'm the right person, and I should know if I want to do a movie.

As an actor, I'm always playing solitary characters. But as a director, I'm always making ensemble movies, which focus on lots of people's lives and how they intertwine.

Any actor working a long time should know how a shot is set up, where to place themselves, how to handle the lines. I'm a member of the crew, like the best boy, the electrician. What I'm good at is making eyes at the camera.

My earliest memories are doing commercials and TV.