Every one of us is a perfect human being, deformed by the family, the society and the culture.

The tarot is sacred.

My father was an atheist, absent. He was a salesman; I was four years old when he told me that the end of life was death.

In Mexico, when we want to speak deep secrets, we drink pulgue together. It is a drink made from the cactus plant, and when you take the bottle from your mouth, it leaves a string behind, between the mouth and the bottle, like a spider's web. It shows that the truth sticks inside.

I am not like Hitchcock, directing the reaction of the public or the audience. I don't like that. I think this is some kind of fascism - 'You need to react like that.' No. No. It's not like this; everyone needs to react as he can.

Psychoanalysis wants to heal with words and speaking, but sometimes with speaking, you realize nothing.

I tweet 15 times a day to keep my brain stimulated.

Revolutions are of no us;, it is necessary to work on transforming the brain: on sowing a different knowledge/awareness, on creating a new conscience, that is like a magic box full of brains.

I want to liberate my imagination and my mind with every kind of movie. That is what I wanted to do all my life.

When I was a young person I went to the university and I learned a rational language, to think with the left side of the brain. But in the right side of the brain you have intuition and imagination. Words are not the truth; they indicate the way to go, but you need to go alone, in silence. Symbols have a language that kills the words.

I am an artist, you understand? For me, a picture is like poetry. When you make art, this is not coming from an intellectual place. It's coming from the deep side of your unconscious, your soul.

We are all working for the immortality of the human consciousness.

Tarantino's 'Django' amused me very much. It is as made by an adult that was still a child.

I was alone as a child. I lived in fairytales, adventures, Shakespeare. They are the friends, my books.

George Harrison wanted to play the thief in 'Holy Mountain.'

Accepting death is a massive problem for everybody.

When my father died, I did not cry. When my cat died three days later, I cried a lot.

Lady Gaga has a lot of energy, and that is fantastic, but she is using old surrealist images.

I hated Peter O'Toole. I wanted to kill that guy! When they said he was dead, I was happy. People said, 'Poor Peter O'Toole.' I was happy!

I liked Lady Gaga's meat dress. It was funny.

For me, surrealism is in my blood; it's not an effort.

If you are great, 'El Topo' is a great picture. If you are limited, 'El Topo' is limited.

My ideal audience is on the young side, eager to mutate and move to a higher level of consciousness. I want my images to turn the viewer's brain into what it is: a flying carpet.

We only have problems we really want to have.

I didn't want to make cinema so a person forgets himself and has a lot of fun. 'I forget myself, I am a little poor consumer.' I wanted to make a picture where someone who sees it say, 'This is me! This is me!'

Don't make your living with cinema because Hollywood will take you, will eat you, will destroy you. This is the reality. You have a good picture, have success, you take the person and they destroy you.

Surrealism was necessary - essential, even - in the 1920s to bridge the gap between rationalism and the subconscious. It started something important. But by the early '60s, it had become petit-bourgeois; it was too intellectual and romantic, and had ground to a halt. It had become respectable.

My second wife, the mother of one of my sons, died of murder. I was not with her, but I could have saved her. I think.

My wife is 37 years younger than me. I don't feel the difference.

A man doesn't cry. In my life, I've never cried. I cannot do it. I am a man. How will I cry?

One day I was sitting in my own pain, and suddenly all the pain and troubles of the world came to me. I received all the pain of the world, all through my body.