Filmmaking Quotes

• There are no rules in filmmaking. Only sins. And the cardinal sin is dullness.

  Frank Capra

  Movie, Inspiring, Sin

  Recalled on his death in People, 16 Sep 1991.

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• There are no rules in filmmaking

  Frank Capra

  Recalled on his death in People, 16 Sep 1991.

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• The most honest form of filmmaking is to make a film for yourself.

  Peter Jackson

  Movie, Jobs, Play

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Read, read, read, read, read, read, read, read, read, read, read, read, read...if you don't read, you will never be a filmmaker.

  Werner Herzog

  Filmmaker, Ifs

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• Hollywood is still the mecca for good or bad, but it isn't the beginning or end for filmmaking.

  Robert Duvall

  Movie, Hollywood, Actors

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• Filmmaking is to me very similar to being in a café somewhere in Paris and looking at the people walking by.

  Claire Denis

  Paris, People, Walking

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• Cinema is a matter of what's in the frame and what's out.

  Martin Scorsese

  Movie, Gambling, Film Directing

  FaceBook post by Martin Scorsese from Jul 08, 2013

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• Filmmaking isn’t if you can just strap on a camera onto an actor, and steadicam, and point it at their face, and follow them through the movie, that is not what moviemaking is, that is not what it’s about. It’s not just about getting a performance. It’s also about the psychology of the cinematic moment, and the psychology of the presentation of that, of that window.

  David Fincher

  Psychology, Cameras, Actors

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• Filmmaking is a chance to live many lifetimes.

  Robert Altman

  Inspirational, Motivational, Chance

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Most people don't know what they want or feel. And for everyone, myself included, It's very difficult to say what you mean when what you mean is painful. The most difficult thing in the world is to reveal yourself, to express what you have to... As an artist, I feel that we must try many things - but above all, we must dare to fail. You must have the courage to be bad - to be willing to risk everything to really express it all.

  John Cassavetes

  Mean, Artist, People

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• Filmmaking is incredible introspective. It forces you to sort of examine yourself in new ways.

  Drew Goddard

  Way, Incredibles, Force

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• Nobody will ever notice that. Filmmaking is not about the tiny details. It's about the big picture.

  Ed Wood

  Movie, Inspiring, Details

  "Fictional character: Ed Wood". "Ed Wood", 1994.

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• A film is - or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme, what's behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later.

  Stanley Kubrick

  Movie, Film Directing, Independent Filmmaking

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• I think there are advantages to different scales of filmmaking. You wouldn't want to do just one thing.

  Christopher Nolan

  Movie, Thinking, Actors

  Interview with Jeff Otto, www.ign.com. June 6, 2005.

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• Never try to convey your idea to the audience - it is a thankless and senseless task. Show them life, and they'll find within themselves the means to assess and appreciate it.

  Andrei Tarkovsky

  Art, Mean, Ideas

  "Sculpting in Time" by Andrei Tarkovsky, (p. 152), 1986.

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• Pick up a camera. Shoot something. No matter how small, no matter how cheesy, no matter whether your friends and your sister star in it. Put your name on it as director. Now you're a director. Everything after that you're just negotiating your budget and your fee.

  James Cameron

  Inspirational, Motivational, Friends

  James Cameron, Brent Dunham (2012). “James Cameron: Interviews”, p.117, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• 

  The more successful the villain, the more successful the picture.

  Alfred Hitchcock

  Successful, Film Directing, Directors

  Quoted in Francois Truffaut Hitchcock (1968).

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• IN CINEMA IT IS NECESSARY NOT TO EXPLAIN, BUT TO ACT UPON THE VIEWER'S FEELINGS, AND THE EMOTION WHICH IS AWOKEN IS WHAT PROVOKES THOUGHT.

  Andrei Tarkovsky

  Art, Feelings, Cinema

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• Howard Hughes was this visionary who was obsessed with speed and flying like a god... I loved his idea of what filmmaking was.

  Martin Scorsese

  Ideas, Flying, Visionaries

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• I'm Godless. I've had to make my God, and my God is narrative filmmaking

  Darren Aronofsky

  Movie, Actors, Narrative

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• A story should have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order.

  Jean-Luc Godard

  Movie, Order, Should Have

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• Filmmaking is not a balancing act, although some directors think it is. I don't believe in it. I like ups and downs. They're the best way to translate my feelings to the screen.

  Takashi Miike

  Believe, Thinking, Feelings

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• Filmmaking in general is about feeling and not about theory. You need to know a lot of rules about filmmaking: character development, grammar, and all these thing, but then you use it instinctively. I ask myself this question all the time. I have no solid theory, I just do what I feel is right.

  Hany Abu-Assad

  Character, Feelings, Needs

  Source: blogs.indiewire.com

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• Cinema should make you forget you are sitting in a theater.

  Roman Polanski

  Movie, Inspiring, Humorous

  "Values of the Wise: Aspiring to 'The Life of Value'". Book by Jason Merchey, 2004.

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• I wanted to describe the world at the same time, through image, express what I felt. It was the time of the great documentary filmmakers: Richard Leacock, Joris Ivens. Today, television has put an end to this type of filmmaking.

  Krzysztof Kieslowski

  Television, World, Today

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