Doug Liman Quotes

When I'm writing, I don't put faces on the characters. When I finish the first draft of the script, I start visualizing, and sometimes then I think about one actor.

The least consideration of any film I've ever worked on is who is right for it.

There are no great scripts - just great films.

A good script and perfect casting, that's 90 percent of the work.

Most of my films have been very character driven.

What should be driving the conversation is: What's the story? What's the movie about? Is it a compelling story? And if it is, then you make it regardless of the color of the people behind or in front of the camera.

I love to choose the right actors. It's kind of a pleasure to work with them and watch them imbue your concepts that you write.

You could make a film out of just about anything so long as there is a clear vision about the story.

I just always look for stuff that has a character-driven thing.

My own personal process with movies is to develop the characters with the actors and, when I've done that properly, you can't imagine anyone else, but that actor, playing that part.

I want to try not to repeat myself. But then I seem to do it continuously in my films. It's not something I make any effort to do. I just want to make films that are personal, but interesting to an audience. I feel I get criticized for style over substance, and for details that get in the way of the characters. But every decision I make is how to bring those characters forward.

It's usually the exact same three things which are, the Scripts, the Director and the Role those are the three things I look for and really any two of them, If I get two of them that's usually enough, but definitely those are the things I look for.

I had great luck with Tim McGraw twice in 'Friday Night Lights' and 'The Kingdom.' I love finding off-beat casting and finding someone you know in one way and you reinvent them in another way. I like doing that as a director.

You read a script, you try and think through what is the best, most wide-ranging way of telling the story: who stylistically, character-logically, psychologically fits inside the world of what you're trying to do. A lot of it, when you're casting, is trying to get yourself in the head of a director.

When you have a script, and you're discussing what it can be, and who going to play what role, that's a kind of like a fantasy football game. You can imagine these different dream teams interpreting these characters that only exist in your head.

What has always been at the heart of film making was the value of a script. It was really the writer who could make or break a film. But as we all know, the writer has always been at the bottom of the creative heap.

When I was working on 'Big Fan,' I didn't really feel like any lines needed to be changed or enhanced or expanded upon in any way. I thought it was a solid script. All you had to do was what it said.

Every frame and every scene has to have an intention.

I never have particular actors planned when I'm in the process of writing.

I never write with an actor in mind - never.

I really loved making 'A Walk to Remember', so I'm not afraid of making smaller films. But for me, I just need to connect to the characters.

There are many aspects to directing that have a romantic place in people's minds.

What always leads me in terms of my movies are characters.

The best of all kinds of movies are character-driven, and I definitely don't want to lose sight of why Derek and I started to write movies together in the first place.

Every so often when I'm writing, a character might actually be a distinct person in my head - often not an actor or a face, literally a person who just seems to exist in my imagination. Then the challenge is finding somebody who is close enough to that to make me feel like I've ended up where I wanted to be.