Quotes on Film

Though "Veer-Zaara" is a film about cross-border love, there isn't a word of politics in it. Forget politics, there isn't slap, not even a raised voice in "Veer-Zaara"(2004). It's a very intense, humane and emotional story. "Veer-Zaara" (2004) is a humble tribute to my home in Punjab. It's my tribute to the one-ness of people on both sides of the border. Every religion preaches peace. Then why the bloodshed for the sake of religion? Why are we destroying each other?.

Language is much closer to film than painting is.

I'm a Method actor. I spent years training for the drinking and carousing I had to do in this film.

A good film script should be able to do completely without dialogue.

If my films don't show a profit, I know I'm doing something right.

I don't want ever to appear in a film that would embarrass a viewer. A man can take his wife, mother, and his daughter to one of my movies and never be ashamed or embarrassed for going.

The business side of film has goofed up so many things, but even that's changing. It happened to the music industry and now it's happening to the film studios. It's crazy what's going on. But artists should have control of their work; especially if, as I always say, you never turn down a good idea and never take a bad idea.

There are only 24 hours in a day, and my top priority is working on my films, but I love short film experiments.

None of the films I've done was designed for a mass audience, except for 'Indiana Jones.' Nobody in their right mind thought 'American Graffiti' or 'Star Wars' would work.

The secret to film is that it's an illusion.

You will never age for me, nor fade, nor die.

As you get older naked stuff [on film] gets easier. It's more to do with the role than what men in the audience think. There's a liberation about it.

People sometimes forget all the films that we've done. They remember the likes of 'Malcolm X' and 'Do the Right Thing.' But I've been working since 1986. From the beginning, I was determined to not just be a flash in the pan. I've got to keep up with Woody Allen. He's lapping me.

I didn't dream about being a director. I didn't know I wanted to do something with film until the summer between my sophomore and junior years at Morris College in Atlanta, Georgia.

Acting is not a competition; everything must be done for the good of the film or else everybody loses.

Sometimes films ignore other points of view because it's simpler to tell the story that way, but the more genuine and sympathetic you are to different points of view and situations, the more real the story is.

You make a film to distract people, to interest them, perhaps to make them think, perhaps to help them be a little less naive, a little better than they were.

What you're really after when you see a film or listen to a song is a singular vision, and I'm not sure how much of that you really get in Hollywood.

Film seems to be a medium designed for betrayal and violence.

Never stop. Never stop fighting. Never stop dreaming. And don’t be afraid of wearing your heart on your sleeve - in declaring the films that you love, the films that you want to make, the life that you’ve had, and the lives you can help reflect in cinema. For myself, for a long time… maybe I felt inauthentic or something, I felt like my voice wasn’t worth hearing, and I think everyone’s voice is worth hearing. So if you’ve got something to say, say it from the rooftops.

I suppose all of my films have a common theme. If I think about it, though, the only theme I can think of is really a question: Why can’t people be happier together?