Alejandro Amenabar Quotes

I've certainly worked with really great directors who haven't acted.

A lot of directors want to storyboard you, whereas the best way to get a performance out of an actor is a collaborative process where you listen to the actor's input.

The concept of making a movie in which the director dictates is kind of exotic - and absolutely not truthful. Directing means allowing a great deal of collaboration and listening and having the ability to change your mind.

Most of the great directors I've worked with - De Palma, Spike Lee - like rehearsals.

A film is a director's vision... there is, however, much input an actor or actress can have.

I'm not a huge kind of visual director. For me, it's all about the acting. There's no greater buzz than working with actors and seeing what they can do and how much they can improve on what you'd written. That will always be on the top of my list. It's a real privilege to see it live before anyone else sees it.

I think what makes a good actor's director is the same thing that makes a good director. Acting is just one of the trades necessary to make a movie.

Film is a collaborative medium, and I very much enjoy that.

Filmmaking is a very collaborative art. Unlike a painting that an artist paints sitting by himself, as a director, you have to work with a team.

If I'm directing actors, I learn about acting that way. If I'm acting, I learn about directing that way. Producing is just something that's come about because there's projects I find interesting that I would like to help get done.

I made all these great musicals with Judy Garland. It was all about me going into a barn and saying: 'Let's put on a show.' That's what me and Judy did.

Movies are weird; it's like trying to make a painting with one hundred people. It's a weird world, but every job is weird; it's always a little bit hard, crazy and fun, a nice combination.

'Do the Right Thing' was like the first film where I really felt comfortable working with actors.

There is no sense in doing a wonderful script with somebody who can't direct because that is a disaster.

I guess what I enjoy most is directing, because it incorporates all aspects of filmmaking. Directing is in the same line as acting - both are popularity contests, and in both you're trying to tell a story through the film as a medium.

You can be playing a line some way and the director wants you to change that, or you can disagree. But I always think that the creative conversation between director and actor is what leads to good work.

What goes on between the actor and director is sacred.

Television and film acting is really fun because you are working with other people and you are not completely responsible for the outcome of the project.

To make films, you have to have boundless energy; you have to work and play with others really, really well, and I'm really a more contemplative kind of person. I like to sit at home and think, a lot.

Filmmaking is such a collaborative medium.

When I'm playing as an actor, I don't want to interfere at all with the director. I'm just an actor. I'm totally respectful.

When you make a movie, it's up to so many things and so many people.

Sometimes, with directors, you have to take what they say and translate it in your head, into something that makes sense to you, because you're speaking two different languages.

Most actors go, 'I read the script and fell in love with it'; I fall in love with the directors.

I think every actor would probably say that it's always a collaboration. And if you ask directors, they'll tell you that they expect the actors to bring something. They don't want to be thinking for everybody.