Anna Kendrick Quotes

'Beyond the Lights' was my fourth film. I gained a lot of knowledge, and I'm excited to share that with young filmmakers because I know how lost I was coming out of film school with that question of 'What's next?'

I had a pretty steep learning curve in film - as I'm still learning.

I was fortunate to write pretty much a year out of film school and start making movies in the Hollywood studio system. But with each progressive film it became more frustrating not being able to speak and say things I wanted to say.

I had no education in filmmaking. I started with a 8mm camera. I made 34 films, and little by little I gained more experience in filming.

I did learn a lot from 'Things We Lost in the Fire,' but I've learned different things from different films.

The fact is that the learning process goes on, and so long as the voices are not stilled and the singers go on singing some of it gets through.

We all learn every day, and that's the magic about film making.

I was lucky enough to have made a tonne of mistakes and be kind of frustrated. I was working in the movies for 15 years before I did 'Paranormal Activity,' so I was lucky enough to have that experience. So instead of trying to make, like, 'Godzilla' after 'Paranormal Activity,' I said, 'Let's keep making inexpensive movies.'

The essential nature of all filmed entertainment is that you area always straddling the line of whether or not you can realize something that you want to do.

I believe acting and teaching are not so far apart. As a teacher, you educate. And films educate, too, but they do it in a massive way.

'Main Hoon Na' will always be special since it was my first film but in my subsequent films, I was trying to show off with gimmicks that didn't aid the narrative in any way.

I spent two years telling studio heads that it wasn't a cancer picture. I hate cancer pictures. I don't want to see a cancer picture. There is only one thing worth saying about cancer, and that is that there are human beings in cancer wards.

The truth is, writing and directing are two very different jobs. They're not even remotely the same job. It took me a while, as a director, to understand that.

I think it seems like a natural progression to go into directing, and I hope to explore more of it, because it's very exciting and a really good way to collide all the things that you've known and experienced in the business and put them all into one.

Well, this movie I've been working on for a while. I had the idea for the movie like twenty years ago when I was doing 'Empire of the Sun' in 1987 because at that time that's when all these Vietnam movies were being made and my friends and I were going on auditions for these Vietnam movies and my friends were getting them and going away to fake boot camps.

I'm a big fan of the Pixar movies, and Ed Catmull, who wrote a book about his experiences producing them, talks about how it takes three or four years to get it right.

It's already not as easy, in the sense that interesting roles for girls and women tend to be few and far between. That's just the reality that I think most people would agree with. So that can be frustrating. I just get sent so many things that are like, "So, here's another story about a guy...." But that's just what it is. I'm kind of getting more excited about developing my own stuff, or getting involved early in projects and doing my best to make things that I care about happen.

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

I have great people surrounding me and helping me out. I'm totally in love with directing movies and I hope to do more of it.

I got to watch Frank Capra, in his eighties, in action. You read all the stories about Frank Capra fighting with the head of Columbia, Harry Cohn, "It's my way or the highway." I got to watch that. He lambasted me, "You cannot do this. You will fail." Finally, after another hour of conversation, I convinced him to help me write the speech.

Now that I've got a way in [to the industry] - because it can feel a bit like, "How can I possibly write a film?" - but now that I've got at least some experience in the film world, I'd absolutely love to do it again.

...don't spoil my learning process!

I got my first part in Silent Fall, 1994 - I guess I was 15 or 16 - which was really outrageous because I still knew nothing. I don't think I really learned how to land on my marks until after Empire Records in 1995, 'cause sometimes I'll see a shot in that film, and I'm like "Whoa, I just walked over to the corner."

If someone were to hire me for a film they'd be getting a certain kind of package, that's for sure, a certain set of tools. But I would listen to the director.

When you make movies, you've picked the most expensive art form, and somebody has to pay for it. You kind of owe it to them to at least let them know how you expect to make it as accessible to as many people as you can, given the story you're telling.