Quotes on Film

Whereas money is a means to an end for a filmmaker, to the corporate mind money is the end. Right now, I think independent film is very confused, because there's excess pressure in the marketplace for entertainment to pay off.

That is another chamber of my heart that shows no electrical activity - the chamber that used to flicker into life when I saw a film that moved me, or read a book that inspired me, or listened to music that made me want to cry. I closed that chamber myself, for all the usual reasons. And now I seem to have made a pact with some philistine devil: if I don't attempt to re-open it, I will be allowed just enough energy and optimism to get through a working day without wanting to hang myself.

At its best, film should be like a ski jump. It should give the viewer the option of taking flight, while the act of jumping is left up to him.

I'll go to the movies and hear 'Angel From Montgomery' in some film, and nobody ever even told me about it. They don't tell you your stuff is going to be in a movie. They don't have to, so they don't tell you. You get paid eventually.

Filmmaking is exploring. Why would I want to make a film about something I already understand?

My stage successes have provided me with the greatest moments outside myself, my film successes the best moments, professionally, within myself.

Going back to my film education, I always have that voice in my head that's always screaming, 'Sell out!' And that's good: you want that, because it keeps you on your toes, and it's important to remember what's actually important.

Watch the film, not the stopwatch.

I suffer much less than many of my colleagues. I am perfectly able to go to Australia and film within three hours of arrival.

Like every novelist, I fantasise about film. Novelists are not equipped to make a movie, in my opinion. They make their own movie when they write: they're casting, they're dressing the scene, they're working out where the energy of the scene is coming from, and they're also relying tremendously on the creative imagination of the reader.

A wide screen just makes a bad film twice as bad.

My initial thoughts about what a title can do was to set mood and the prime underlying core of the film's story, to express the story in some metaphorical way. I saw the title as a way of conditioning the audience, so that when the film actually began, viewers would already have an emotional resonance with it.

Sure, they were simple desk lamps with only a minimal amount of movement, but you could immediately tell that Luxo Jr. was a baby, and that the big one was his mother. In that short little film, computer animation went from a novelty to a serious tool for filmmaking.

Every film is a political act; it's how you see the world.

Making a film is hard because you're not dealing with the intangible. When you're writing, it's perfect because it's only in your head and then you have to take it into the physical world and that's where things drop off and things fall apart and you have to fix them.

I just want to see more women in film and behind the camera. I'm tired of seeing movies from one perspective.

If you're a film fan, collecting video is sort of like marijuana. Laser discs, they're definitely cocaine. Film prints are heroin, all right? You're shooting smack when you start collecting film prints. So, I kinda got into it in a big way, and I've got a pretty nice collection I'm real proud of.

A film that aims low should not be praised for hitting that target.

A film is a terrible thing to waste.

It's always seemed to me that photography tends to deal with facts whereas film tends to deal with fiction.

The impact of the black audience is expressing itself. They look to films to be more expressive of their needs, their lives. Hollywood has gotten that message - finally.