William Fichtner Quotes

It's not that there aren't people who care creatively in the world of television, but there's always a bit more time in making a movie. I always feel films are more of a creative journey.

I've always looked at filmmaking as a lifestyle. There is no decision of when you go to work. It's a way of life: you're thinking about scripts; you see things and think, 'That could be interesting'... I don't think about my work as, 'Today I'll work on this, this and that.' It just comes to me.

Film is very much about sitting around and talking about ideas, and that's the stuff that I love, but I haven't experienced that yet in the television that I've done so far. It makes me long for movies again because, creatively, I always have a much more fulfilling experience there.

Making a film is a beautiful mystery. You go deep into the wood, and you don't want to come out of that wood.

When you make a movie, you can only make the movie that you would want to see.

For me, every film is an interesting experience.

It's a way of living, cinema. And I see my family, I do this and that, I travel. It's a long process to let it happen.

Making a movie is, for me, like painting. I just enjoy the care that goes into every brushstroke and the choice of every color. I enjoy the intensity of it.

I think the idea of embracing the process, creating something, no matter how thin it is, that you can call a starting point - whether it's a word or it's an idea, or it's a little piece of narrative that you might base a film on - starting that journey of making the work. That's also something that every individual does very differently.

I think that cinema and television have nothing in common. There is a breaking point between photography and cinema on the one hand and television and virtual reality on the other hand.

I've done a lot of independent film, which are short shoots that are usually four to six weeks, max. I enjoy everything. After one particular experience of work, I like to go in the opposite direction and do a short film, or something else.

Film is definitely a director's medium. They're responsible for the look and everything, and you're a part of that process as an actor, and you try to contribute to the story. But I think it might sound a little pretentious for me to say I think of myself as an artist. I think of myself as a creative person.

You always want to do something different. I enjoy the process. I like making movies, and it's increasingly hard to find a movie you'd want to make.

I've always seen it to be a privilege to make movies. It's a really expensive, creative medium.

With movies and TV, storytelling, it's a different medium. I really love it, but I'm one part of many, many pieces of that puzzle and a lot of it is out of my control.

It's a really unique situation where you just - you make independent films or you make big blockbuster movies, but it's very rare when all of those ingredients come together, and you can really tell a story that you care about with a character you absolutely love with the people you love making movies with.

It sounds really corny but every film that you do is its own journey, it's its own experience, it's its own thing. Often you think it's going to be one way and then it goes another way - you think you can chart a character and then other things happen. That's the amazing thing about our jobs, it's constantly changing and it's extremely dynamic and you therefore have to be dynamic as well.

Whatever field you can do that, that's where you want to do it, and I think that's why people like David Fincher and Ridley Scott are interested in it, too, because when you sit down on a meeting in HBO and they're like, "More, more." You're just like, "Oh yeah, I love this." Sometimes it's a little harder in film. I think also it's a great audience, take advantage of it. It's a great audience.

I'm pretty focused on what I do. I think directing is a very specific talent, and I'm not real big on putting puzzles together, which is basically what a film is.

Movies are details. Movies are billions of details that come into a certain moment. So with all the years and months and weeks and days and minutes of preparation, then finally you're shooting and it all comes down to these moments when you're shooting, which is sort of insane when you think about it. The details make a difference.

It's really interesting to observe each filmmaker's approach to filmmaking and I feel very fortunate to have worked with a lot of really interesting filmmakers and they all approach their job in unique ways.

I'd love to just think of myself as a filmmaker, and I wait for the day when the modifier can be a moot point.

I don't want to have anything to say, it just gets in the way. I think the journey of an artist is a journey of discovery and some engagements with paint, with the nature of material, with bodily things...One wants to open the story, not close it.

I don't think we've seen any cinema yet. I think we've seen 100 years of illustrated text.

When I go into the studio, I completely detach. I let my emotions come out.