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Film is really the one art form that can effectively use silence. Music and theater can play with silence, but they can't sustain silence without losing energy, whereas film can go into a silent mode and stay there for minutes at a time.

I love silent cinema but don't hold it sacred. Like any branch of film there are some very boring films alongside the masterpieces.

Music is such an odd thing when you think about it - behind an image until you take it away, and then you realize a movie sounds blank without it.

In the end, you don't want music to be noticed as much as digested and integrated into the storytelling. And make audiences sit forward in their seats and enjoy the movie.

Silent films were, I think, more different than we know to sound films. We think of it as simply that we added dialogue and in actual fact I think it was an entirely different art form.

I like some of the early silent films because I love to watch how actors had to play then. What would interest me today is to do a silent film.

I always loved silent movies. I was not a specialist, but I loved them. And when I started directing, I became really fascinated by the format - how it works, the device of the silent movie. It's not the same form of expression as a talkie. The lack of sounds makes you participate in the storytelling.

I think the cinema you like has more to do with silence, and the theater you like has more to do with language.

When I started out, I preferred to watch my films without music, as its presence tends to mask the underlying pace of the film. I felt I could feel the rhythm of the film better without music to influence me.