Mads Mikkelsen
I will never be a fan of any kind of political correctness: I think it's instant death to creativity.Collection: Death
I like to stay home with my family. But travel is good in a way. It makes you redefine each other each time you see each other. Also, it helps that I think my wife is the hottest woman in the world.Collection: Family
When I do outdoor scenes, I tend to find a quiet space where I can sit and carve a walking stick that can turn out to be interesting for me.Collection: Space
I was a late bloomer, but I had a career as a contemporary dancer before that, so I had some kind of connection to this world. But I was always a little more in love with the drama of dancing than the aesthetics, so I thought, 'Why don't you give it a chance if you think you can do it a little different?'Collection: Chance
I'm a beer man. I tried to drink whiskey and Scotch, but I don't get it. It smells like a girl who didn't shower and just splashed a lot of perfume on.
I'd rather be voted 'the sexiest man in Denmark' than 'the ugliest man in Denmark'.
I don't wear cologne. I do occasionally, but anytime I take a shower, I just put on deodorant. That's basically what I smell like.
Sometimes you're trying your best and you still can't find a solution, but I try not to waste my life living in a dark place.
I was into sports and swimming as a kid and didn't spend a whole lot of time sitting down. I was a gymnast.
I felt perhaps 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo' was a little premature. It was a huge hit around the world - it was still running in the theatres - and the Americans at that time were already shooting the remake, and I was like, 'Whoa! Give it a break of five or six years and get a little inspired, and then do it.'
We can ask ourselves why we invent God, and then, ten minutes later, we invent Satan - why? Because we need him; there's something fascinating about the other side of the coin.
I'm engaged to Hollywood. If there's something I find I have to do, I'll do it. Otherwise, I'll just stay home and have a vacation.
I was a very focused kid. I always had this crazy lifestyle... billions of jobs, two hours of gymnastics every day, handball, anything with a ball, really. I must have had ADHD or something. I was very energetic, and very small. I didn't start growing until the last year of high school.
There is a tendency to underestimate the power of what we can do without words. Sometimes you can make a scene even more powerful and precise without dialogue.
In Denmark, we're making 20 films a year. If I'm showing up in even two of those, people will get tired of me really fast.
England and Denmark have a sense of irony and a darker sense of humour that you don't necessarily find in Germany and Sweden.
I was a gymnast for many years before I was a dancer, so it comes in pretty handy when we do stunts.
I was not into sci-fi, science fiction, at all. I was into some of the old pirate films with Burt Lancaster and stuff. I liked them.
I've never been specifically attached to westerns, but there are those I like - one of the best westerns I've seen is 'Unforgiven.' I think the genre has something extremely powerful that can allow them to talk about good and evil in a very straight way.
I always try to find something I like about the bad guys and then try to find the mistakes and the flaws in the good guys.
I like 'The Three Musketeers.' I like those kind of cool things where they were having a robe and a sword.
If I was doing 'The Hunt' constantly, I would get very old, very fast.
II know a little about Greek mythology. It's not that far away from the Nordic mythology.
I'm very proud of 'Valhalla Rising.'
We have no chance to comprehend what goes on there - it's so dramatic, and people are so poor. We all felt bad about being there. Filming in India felt like we were going to borrow something knowing that we were never going to give it back.
I like to stay home with my family.
I'm a big fan of film for one reason: because it is visual.
I'm not even on Facebook. I've got enough friends I never see. You know how you have a lot of friends you never call? I don't have time for new friends, and I don't want to be friends with someone only online.
If David Bowie wants, I'll put him in my phone book.
If you're not bruised up, then you're not doing an action film in a real way.
Denmark is a small place. We all know each other.
I'm terrified about psychic people who have their little shops. I always walk across the street and go somewhere else. Imagine if one of them came out with their face all pale and said, 'Hurry up and enjoy yourself.' No one wants to know that.
In a way, we tried to make 'The Salvation' a contemporary film with contemporary emotions. At the same time, in the script, you get a feel that all the small talk is not a part of our universe. It's more precise talk.
I'm not ambitious about my career, but I am ambitious with each job. I can be fairly annoying to work with.
I never really planned a career. I've tried to avoid it. I've tried to do this stuff I felt for, the stuff I like. So, I've just been meeting these fantastic directors who've offered me a variation of different parts and different films.
I make an awesome soup with coconut milk and shrimps; it takes me five hours to prepare the whole thing. It does become very spicy, but you can definitely taste all the ingredients.
I have the strange ability to shut things out.
I've never been a big fan of making telepathy to the audience. That would be too much a wink in the eye. That would make people around me fools, right?
I became a dancer late and an actor late.
Actors are a race.
Machiavelli had some cold tricks for people who wanted to be demagogues and wanted to take over the world.
Sometimes we misunderstand what films can do. We just throw a whole book in there, with people just talking, talking, and talking. The picture can tell, the frame can tell.
Danish film is spreading in a fantastic way.
If you're playing the bad guy, you have to find what you like about them.
I have an enormous metabolism, so I'm lucky.
I come from a culture where you don't divide it up to what you can do on TV and what you can do on film.
Once you do one bad guy, usually all you get offered is bad guys.
I'm not looking for a challenge, necessarily. I'm looking to make a really great film.
If you spend a week at a casino you will very easily see that people have a certain way of behaving in a casino.
Sometimes you have a period piece where you have to research around it but, if the writers have done their homework well enough, the information is all in the script.