Luchino Visconti Quotes

All of my heroes, like Dali, are people who pioneered various forms of cinema.

Luis Bunuel made great movies.

To make great movies, there is an element of risk. You have to say, 'Well, I am going to make this film, and it is not really a sure thing.'

A true artist is always out of his time.

As a director, you try to find what is creative.

But I think the thing I'm proud of about the film is that there aren't many films - either independent films or mainstream Hollywood films - that are like this; it's of its own times, and it's the film Mike Nichols wanted to make.

There is certainly a part of my filmmaking that harkens to a more simpler commercial kind of taste, but then with this there's certainly a kind of avant-garde, abstract, existential element to it.

I'm not really a director for hire. You read these scripts and go, 'This is a really great script, but Paul Greengrass would make this so much better than me.' I usually say, 'I know who would be good for this. It's not me.'

It was great to watch Orson Welles, not only as an actor but as a director.

You make a movie, and if somebody reads something into it, then great, more power to him.

I've realised that if I aim for a successful record, I probably won't have any success. But if I keep making weird things, then hopefully the audiences will come to us.

I feel like I'm a filmmaker; I don't feel I need to yell action and cut.

None of my movies have ever made any money, so it's not about commercial success for me. It's always the same thing. I want to create something valuable, something unusual and different that the world has never seen.

For me, each film, each script is like a little journey in itself, and I'm reinventing the wheel. It's like, 'How do I make this film?' That's part of the pleasure, and that's why I'm not a normal professional director.

Films should involve a director's idiosyncrasies as much as possible I think.

Cinema is diversifying; there's room for every kind of cinema today.

You hear ten seconds of a song, and you know it's OutKast. There's a strangeness about it because it's catchy, but it's not just pop for the sake of pop. They're pushing the envelope.

I think I'll always be making movies that intend to say something new.

I remember John Waters's 'Pink Flamingos,' that was the film where I realized you could do anything you want - there were no boundaries.

I'm never trying to be commercial or accessible, or saying "let's do this weird stuff, but at the same time we gotta do this safe stuff".

That's the artist's role - to strike out always for something new, to break away, to defy, to... grapple with the unfamiliar.

All art is based on non-conformity.

It's difficult to find new solicitations, new expressions. But this is talking about filmmaking. Cinema.

I am an artist who's just tryin' to do something different, and basically not caring about everybody's opinions and wanting to follow what everybody else is doing. At the same time, I know when to be serious, but I know when to joke.

I've always wanted to direct and as I grow and I get older and I get older I just want to let that evolve.