Joshua Oppenheimer

I think it's our obligation as filmmakers, as people investigating the world, to create the reality that is most insightful to the issues at hand. Here are human beings, like us, boasting about atrocities that should be unimaginable.

At Harvard, direct cinema was the core of the film department, and most of the students were trying to make socially conscious works, but I was trying to combine fiction and non-fiction to show how our seemingly factual world is constituted through fantasy and stories.

I'm a human garbage can, but I don't like veggies unless they have Velveeta cheese on top. And forget crunchy broccoli and carrots. I like 'em soggy, soft and wilted. The nutrients have probably gone away, but that's the only way I can eat them.