If I'm making a film and I'm not loving everything about it, then I know I've got to change something until I do.

I've had a couple of films in which the people who were the principals were still alive and you can draw on them. In this case, we had a magnificent book by William Nack - really the definitive biography of Secretariat - and Penny Chenery had been a great source for that, not only in terms of understanding what the facts might have been but understanding her perspective. But where I think the real difference comes when you're dealing with someone like that is they help you believe that the extraordinary achievements of character that they did were real. Actors need to believe in what they are doing, and a director's job is to inspire them to believe that. And having the real person to draw on, to sit down and talk with, to look into their eyes and to see that there is fire in Penny's eyes and she is 88 years old and there is just steel in her character. I think that's an inspiration for an actor; I know it's certainly an inspiration for a director.

[about Braveheart (1995)]: Before I wrote the film I had never heard of William Wallace and his story seemed so romantic to me. I think he is an ancestor, I feel his blood in my veins. I can't prove it but then no one can disprove it.