Wim Wenders Quotes

The BAFTAs give the British point of view, and the Oscars give the American point of view, but the truth is we're all working in an international industry.

Imagine, there is almost no possibility for a foreign language film to be distributed in America right now. That doesn't just make the industry poorer, it makes the landscape of cinema poorer, in America. The impossibility to get a good release on a really good European, Latin American, Asian movie is a tragedy.

The problem in Hollywood is that they try to become the only kind of cinema in the world, okay? The imposition everywhere of a unique culture, which is Hollywood culture, and a unique way of life, which is the American way of life. But Hollywood has forgotten that, in the past, what made Hollywood great and what made it go ahead was the fact that Hollywood was fed with, for example, Jewish directors coming from Germany or Austria and enriching Hollywood. In 15, 20 years, Hollywood became imperialistic. Cinema goes ahead when it is marriaged by other culture. Otherwise, it turns on itself.

So I feel a responsibility to help first-time film-makers in Brazil, but also to increase the dialogue between film cultures which are really wonderful and so much closer to us than what we do see on our screens.

Today's cinema is a global art form, it is impossible to make movies for a market the size of France, representing no more than 4% of the world's total.

French cinema has always been very interesting, and it's still very powerful. I think it goes to show that it's great to still have a cinema that doesn't try to emulate, for example, American cinema.

I'm trying to strike a balance between Bollywood and Hollywood.

All of a sudden, there are great Japanese films, or great Italian films, or great Australian films. It's usually because there are a number of people that cross-pollinated each other.

So I am getting a little bored with defining one type of film as American and the other European or from somewhere else because the division is no longer true.

I've never thought about doing international films. But if I get something exciting, I might take it up. Everything depends on what comes my way.

I guess people feel that if you're working with good directors and are known in the Hindi film industry, then you won't work in South films. However, I believe that films have no boundaries of language, religion, or cast. If it's a good script and a good director, I can do a film in Spanish as well.

Good cinema has no regional or linguistic boundaries.

The main difference I'd say is that European cinema has always used less music than American cinema for historical reasons.

Romanian movies are not made the same as American movies are, only because it's newer there. For instance, cigarettes, over there, are much more prominent, and Americans aren't used to that.

Studio movies are looking more like independent movies and independent movies are looking more like studio movies, and I think cinema is better now because of it.

I'm not Ang Lee who knows so much about western market and the taste of western audiences.

It is very good to bridge the gaps between Indian and international cinema.

The Cannes film festival is about big-budget films but also remarkable films made in different political regimes by film-makers with little resources.

We try to magnify the difference between Americans and the English. In real life they like the same music and dress the same. It's really much more similar than anyone thinks or how we show it.

I have zero interest in performing in films to try to convey any kind of message. My job is to be entertaining. There's a very different point of view about messages in films in Europe than there is in the States. Audiences rebel because they feel that they are being preached to.

The cinematic language and interior destiny of each Iranian film-maker is different. The international influences on them vary from Rossellini to Fellini, Akira Kurosawa to Hou Hsiao-hsien, but there is a strong sense of solidarity.

I want to make films that cater to the world audiences.

My ambition has always been to work with English and American actors and directors. Those were the movies that I was watching when I was growing up.

I'm a European, and I live there. I work in European films, and then once in a while, I make an American movie.

I think, for an actor, the whole world is a place of work because if you focus on characters and on stories, they are everywhere, so yeah, I feel very privileged to have had this great opportunities in the international cinema and especially in the American cinema.