Mickey Rourke Quotes

I try to steal from the best. Suck it all in. 'Taxi Driver' is really a bible for film actors, a master class. A lot of emotional power, a lot of emotional depth but it's contained and you just see the tip of the iceberg.

With a film, I do my best to understand the author's intentions and try to bring the characters to life.

A lot of acting requires you to be a charming version of yourself. A lot of what happens in the industry is that you are cast based on other things that people have seen you do, or how you are perceived to look or sound. If everyone thinks you're bizarre and creepy, then you play bad guys.

Each performance and each film is what it is. It's right and belongs within that moment. You look at it and try to make it fit your particular part of your character and your particular film.

Not all actresses know how to express their looks, I think. For me, it's an on-again, off-again thing. I'm still struggling.

I have a hard time watching films and not thinking how I would play any part, whether it's a man or a woman.

In acting, one should look at the film in totality. Improvisations should only be made keeping in mind the limits of a character. Always believe in team work.

When we watch a film as actors, you have to understand that we always see much more than what's on screen.

I'm interested in the intersection of character and actor.

I enjoy sometimes focusing on a character in a scene that's not actually doing the main action or the talking.

I'd like to have a different look for every film. As an actor, I think I should put more emphasis on my performance than on my looks.

One [New York] eatery is a remodeled diner that looks like what Busby Berkeley would have done if only he hadn't had the money.

My favorite films are the ones that I walk away from and I know I saw a story. I saw the core part of the plot. But if I ever take another look at it then I can see that there was some more stuff going on in there that I didn't realize.

She [Susan Lucci] was extraordinary. She wouldn't look at the scene until you walked in to rehearse it. It was amazing to me. That's the impression I got anyway.

When you're playing a character who's cruel, look for the places where he's kind. When you're playing a character who is unhappy, look for the places where he has a glint of merriment.

If you look at Japanese film, it is made up of collage or bricolage, it is made up of lists, and suddenly when you stand back from the lists you begin to see the pattern of a life.

I did a film that was similar to that world, which was Brotherly Love, and the audience fell in love with [my character] June. So to be honest, I remembered what I did in that movie and studied that film and my mannerisms while shooting in Philly.

We get the scripts before the table read, but I don't look at them until we go into the table read. I don't want to know, when I'm playing a moment in the current episode, what's going to happen because it might change how I'm playing that.

As an actor, I look at first what I can borrow from what I really feel.

The actor must know that since he, himself, is the instrument, he must play on it to serve the character with the same effortless dexterity with which the violinist makes music on his. Just because he doesn't look like a violin is no reason to assume his techniques should be thought of as less difficult.

Before I go off and direct a movie, I always look at four films. They tend to be The Seven Samurai, Lawrence Of Arabia, It's A Wonderful Life and The Searchers.

It's in the eyes, mostly. Don't listen just to the other actor's lines. Look at - and listen to - their eyes. That's where the emotion comes through.

If a film has a social message, it is very important for me to know what the message is and how it's going to be delivered, but it's not something I look for all the time.

I don't look back or analyze my films. I just make them. It's for someone else to look at.

Horror films and genre films are interesting, because I always look for a deeper meaning or a deeper theme in the film.