impossible to imagine what we would have been like without it.

The flame is not out, but it is flickering.

I think we too often make choices based on the safety of cynicism, and what we're lead to is a life not fully lived. Cynicism is fear, and it's worse than fear - it's active disengagement.

The Civil War.

OK, I'm going with Altman,

In a sense I've made the same film over and over again. In all of them I've asked, 'Who are we as Americans?