Brian Selznick Quotes

I fell in love with film and its potential. The idea of putting one image next to another image and creating meaning blew my mind.

I don't really believe in the mystery of cinematography - what happens in the camera is what the cinematographers create and all that nonsense - I want the director to see what I'm trying to do.

I have a great little camera, and I had a theory that if the story is interesting, it doesn't matter what medium you shoot it on. You just have to make a good film.

I try and let the film do the talking.

I don't believe in one slow panning-shot to show a place. It should unfurl in the story itself.

For me, the filmmaking has to be about the dramaturgy.

I've directed a fair amount of television series - so I'm always trying to learn new things. One episode was all hand-held and I'm trying to get better at when you should do things and when you should just shut up and watch what the people are saying.

It's a risk, but I'm sort of ready to let go of thinking of movies as books that you can watch. The notion of, 'If I put the narrative blocks in the right order, this will solve all of my storytelling problems.' No, it won't, and you end up with little more than books on film.

It's not a film-maker's job to explain his technique, but to tell his story the best way he can.

Film is the only language I speak, and I have been lucky to be involved in some great stories. You don't want to preach to people, but you want them to think about why things are the way they are, the history that is there as well as the possibilities.

We had a script that was really solid and we knew how we were going to shoot and how the energy of it was going to go. So it gave us a lot of freedom to use the camera as a character.

I'm a storyteller - that's the chief function of a director. And they're moving pictures, let's make 'em move!

You make the movie through the cinematography - it sounds quite a simple idea, but it was like a huge revelation to me.

Writing, of course, is writing, acting comes from the theater, and cinematography comes from photography. Editing is unique to film. You can see something from different points of view almost simultaneously, and it creates a new experience.

I don't use film in the way that the great auteurs do. I use film, the camera, to record as effectively and as perceptive as I am able what I want to say through the actors.

Film gives us the luxury of deciding where the viewpoint of the audience is, and by knowing that, we can very effectively design around what is actually seen on camera.

The camera is the gatekeeper to the audience that's watching you.

Hitchcock loved long convoluted shots that contained a lot of tracking and camera moves.

At any filmmaking class, you learn the power of the visual medium and are always trying to minimise the words.

We should not confuse having a Flip camera with making a documentary.

What I like to do with every film is to bring a form, like a cinematographic proposal. If you watch 'S21,' it's a form; 'Duch, Master of the Gates of Hell' is a different proposal.

When I shoot a film, I take my camera and put it among the characters and let it show you their world, their problems, their happiness and the little things that matter to them.

I'm a visual filmmaker so the camera is a big part of my storytelling tool and it's something that I really rely on to tell a scene or create the suspense that I need and create the emotion of a scene or a sequence.

You usually get one or the other, you get someone who knows how to tell a story but they don't necessarily know about light and camera and rhythm, or you get someone who can make beautiful images but they can't necessarily tell a great story. He does both and I think he's going to be one of the film-makers that our time is remembered for.

The thing is, as a film director, you're essentially alone: You have to tell a story primarily through pictures, and only you know the film you see in your head.