Dialogue: Alfonso Cuaron

It has been a remarkable year for Mexican filmmakers and especially for Alfonso Cuaron, who had two films in contention at this year's Oscars -- "Children of Men," which he co-wrote and directed, and "Pan's Labyrinth," which he produced. On the eve of receiving ShoWest's International Achievement in Filmmaking Award, he spoke with The Hollywood Reporter's Stephen Galloway about the increasingly global movie business.

The Hollywood Reporter: You have made films in Spanish and English; you have lived in New York, and now you live in London. Do you think of yourself as a Mexican filmmaker?
Alfonso Cuaron: My nation is cinema, and my language is film. I make films in film language, and where they are made and the flag are just a circumstance. That comes from (the fact that) human beings are human beings first, and after (that), they give them a passport. But actually, this is very symptomatic of the times we are living in. The world is getting muddled in the interacting of different languages, cultures, countries. It is getting more blurred all the time, the line between what is independent and mainstream and what is considered foreign and domestic.