Cinema is not about format, and it's not about venue. Cinema is an approach. Cinema is a state of mind on the part of the filmmaker. I've seen commercials that have cinema in them, and I've seen Oscar-winning movies that don't. I'm fine with this.
Interpretation
Cinema transcends mere technicalities and locations; it is a mindset driven by creativity.
This quote by Steven Soderbergh emphasizes that cinema is not confined to specific formats or physical places; rather, it is a creative approach and a way of thinking that characterizes the filmmaker's vision. Soderbergh suggests that true cinema can be found in unexpected places, reflecting the idea that artistry lies in intention and expression, rather than strict adherence to conventions.
In practice
This quote can be shared at a film festival to inspire aspiring filmmakers.
If you talk to any filmmaker, and if you said to them, 'I guarantee you x amount of money per month for the rest of your life, and it's not a big amount of money, but I can also guarantee that you will work continually, you will get to make what you want to make,' any filmmaker on the planet will make that kind of deal. I would have made it.
When people say that moviegoing is dead, I go, 'OK, so the makers of 'Get Out' should've sold that movie to a platform? Then they don't have this insane, crazy success theatrically all over the world.'
I want to thank anyone who spends part of their day creating...anybody who spends part of their day sharing their experience with us-I think this world would be unlivable without art and I thank you.
Making a film that's supposed to be fun to watch is really hard - that's the weird irony of it.
A success, to me, is the ability to keep working. That's success. It has nothing to do with money; it's the ability to keep getting things made, period.
You don't go make 'Schizopolis' if you're trying to protect some idea of yourself as a filmmaker.
The system is the work of art; the visual work of art is the proof of the System. The visual aspect can't be understood without understanding the system. It isn't what it looks like but what it is that is of basic importance.
Fantasy isn't just a jolly escape: It's an escape, but into something far more extreme than reality, or normality. It's where things are more beautiful and more wondrous and more terrifying. You move into a world of conflicting extremes.
Art is inherently political. Even trying to make a film that has nothing to do with politics is, in and of itself, a political act.
What entrepreneurs and artists have in common is that they give the world something it didn't know it was missing.
The only story that seems worth writing is a cry, a shot, a scream. A story should break the reader's heart.
Originality is the only thing that counts. But the originator uses material and ideas that occur round him and pass through him. And out of his experience comes the original creation.
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