[on Le cinquième élément (1997)] I started to write it when I was 16. I was not thinking about making a film - I was doing a book. At the age of 20, I wrote already 30 scripts. Because I have nobody in the film business in my family, so the only thing I can have like everybody is a piece of paper and a pen - no one can beat you, you don't need anybody, you just need a pen! So I was spending my day and my night to write, to write, to write, and that's it.

[2011 interview, on Les aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec (2010)] The film is not heavy; it's an ice cream. It's vanilla strawberry with chocolate on top, and fudge. Making it was like a holiday. Two years ago, if you presented me with something heavy, I wouldn't do it. It was the beginning of the global crisis and I didn't want to put more weight on people. There is nothing I can do about the crisis, but at least I can make you smile for two hours.

You can't imagine how many people ask me for a Léon (1994) sequel. Everywhere I go they ask me. If I was motivated by money I would have done it a long time ago. But I don't feel it. When I go to do Angel-A (2005) in black and white, or The Lady (2011) in Burma, I feed myself - and I need that. If I make Léon 3 and Léon 4 and Léon 5 and The Fifth Element 6, 7 and 8, I won't feed myself. I will just repeat myself. The only way for an artist is to go to theatre, read books, see museums, paintings, life, friends, seeing people, feeding yourself, do other types of films.

[2014] I can't do this job just like a business. If I don't love the film and I'm not ready to get exhausted for it, I can't do it. I can't go to Hollywood, take a big cheque and say, "Action!" and "Cut!". It's just not me. I come from the source, from the ground up: putting cables together and holding cameras aged 17, and I'm physically like that. If I believe in a film, I don't care if it's very successful or not successful. I want to be proud of it. I've done films that worked a lot and films that didn't work so well, and I don't care. Angel-A (2005) was a black and white film in French - I love this film - and Les aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec (2010) was a comedy in French, but then Le cinquième élément (1997) was popular everywhere. It doesn't matter because the real life of a film is ten years later. Two years ago I was in Korea and this 15 year-old Korean guy with a red mohawk came up to me aggressively - I was a little scared - and he said, "Subway (1985) is my favourite film!" I asked him how old he was and realised that he wasn't even born when I made it. That's the beauty of film.

In France we have this problem: we cannot admit that movies are also an industry, that a movie is also fun. I think we have the wrong notion of commercial and intellectual or artistic film. Because all films are commercial. When you go to see a film by Jean-Luc Godard, you pay the same price. And believe me, he makes much more money with his little film that cost $1m than lots of people. Two people in a kitchen for two hours in black and white where you say, "Oh, it's so arty." It's a very commercial film because it cost nothing.

[on his threat to retire after directing 10 films] I said if I made 10 films in my life, I would be very lucky. That's how I meant it. My fear after my first one was whether they would let me make another one, so I had this goal in my head. After six, seven films, I started to get a little tired. Shooting takes a lot out of you. You finish a film and most of the time you're half-dead. I was happy to finish after 10.

I was never polluted by the world of cinema. I didn't even have a TV until I was 16. My expression is a reflection of the world I have seen, and in that world everyone was barefoot in bathing suits, following the order of the sea, the natural order of sunrise and sunset. I never went to the cinémathèque. I didn't know much about the masters of world cinema.

Why did I make Subway (1985)? Why did I do all that crazy undersea stuff in Le grand bleu (1988)? Why did I go all black and nasty with Nikita (1990)?. I don't know. Because I did. I do what I do because I want to do it, because I want to explore, go looking for things.

People often say I'm a child at heart. In fact, I think I just have access to [my childhood], I have a very clear memory of it. We were all children once. We just need to show a bit of respect for it.

I do think that kids today miss out on a lot of those guidelines. Parents are always at work; school doesn't necessarily give the framework; politicians are all corruption and scandal; even sporting heroes are tainted with drugs and what have you. Rules are important for kids.

What's so special about all those amazing British children's writers, those who gave us Alice in Wonderland and Robinson Crusoe and Pooh Bear and Peter Pan and Peter Rabbit and the rest, was that they didn't set out to seduce. The great children's writers were authentic, they copied no one, they didn't set out to make money or to preach ideas. They just transcribed their dreams.

Cinema never saved anyone's life, it is not a medicine that will save anyone's life. It is only an aspirin.