Quotes on People

It's important to debunk the myths of Africa being this benighted continent civilized only when white people arrived. In fact, Africans had been creators of culture for thousands of years before. These were very intelligent, subtle and sophisticated people, with organized societies and great art.

Facebook just sounds like a drag, in my day seeing pictures of peoples vacations was considered a punishment

The powers know that the people at large are like children whose despair, sorrow, and tears can be turned into joy with a little toy. ... An army and navy represents the people's toys.

I just make it my business to get along with people so I can have fun. It's that simple.

April is the cruelest month, T.S. Eliot wrote, by which I think he meant (among other things) that springtime makes people crazy. We expect too much, the world burgeons with promises it can't keep, all passion is really a setup, and we're doomed to get our hearts broken yet again. I agree, and would further add: Who cares? Every spring I go out there anyway, around the bend, unconditionally. ... Come the end of the dark days, I am more than joyful. I'm nuts.

People who own property feel a sense of ownership in their future and their society. They study, save, work, strive and vote. And people trapped in a culture of tenancy do not.

There are people who can start having very powerful experiences without taking psychedelics. It can happen against their will. This is a universal phenomenon.

I think that people in general, whether they are male or female, who are inhibited by the clichés of what women are or what men are, really don't like themselves. Because personality traits are not necessarily sexual.

You hope that the responsibility of making movies will fall into the hands of essentially moral people.

I think a lot of creative people are uncomfortable with therapy. Because you're basically trying to 'solve' the unconscious. And the unconscious is where it all comes from.

Dancing is very important to people who play music with a beat. I think that people who don't dance, or who never did dance, don't really understand the beat... I know musicians who don't and never did dance, and they have difficulty communicating.

I am not skilled enough or energetic enough to craft a persona. I just have to be who I am and hope people like it.

The film industry is about saying 'no' to people, and inherently you cannot take 'no' for an answer.

People hear 'Africa' and they think about charitable commercials, or safari tours and animals. It's our responsibility to help change that perspective.

I try to live with honor, even if it costs me millions of dollars and takes a long time. It's very unusual in Hollywood. Few people are trustworthy - a handshake means nothing to them. They feel they're required to keep an agreement with you only if you're successful or they need you.

I have too much respect for people to try to control them. But they are estranged from love, afraid to reach out and touch one another. We're afraid to appear sentimental or speak in platitudes because people will say, 'What a jerk!' It takes courage in our culture to be a lover.

Each time I make a movie, it's a little bit like taking another course in something because there's an argument between these people that I don't necessarily have an answer to.

Throughout my life, I always remember that consideration of people who were less fortunate than we. We lived in an atmosphere of awareness, and we certainly did not live a life whereby we ignored, or felt that we could ignore, that which was in evidence around us.

That's the thing: There are so many art songs in jazz. It's a much more rich experience for the singer than people think.

People assume you can't be shy and be on television. They're wrong.

I think people had somehow gotten the sense that we have explored everything, when that isn't the case. We so know so little about the ocean, and so much of it is being destroyed.