Johan Renck Quotes

Once you've made your first feature, you know what you can do wrong and how hard it is to shoot a feature. Before you do it, you just don't know how hard it is. Once you've done it, when you're writing a second one, it's almost like you're preparing, and it's almost holding you back.

I've produced a couple of films and really enjoyed starting it from the very beginning and seeing it all the way through to the end; that was very gratifying.

Making films has got to be one of the hardest endeavors known to humankind.

The process of making a movie is what I love. I thrive on that. It's an exciting miracle, a mad adventure. I love being part of it.

It was kind of intimidating to make a feature without that much experience.

If you're writing a screenplay for a feature, you don't have any involvement with the casting process, the editing process, the set design, the costume design, or any of that stuff.

It's been 50 years since I was on the roof of my parents' house shooting Hag in a Black Leather Jacket when I didn't even know there was such a thing as editing. I thought you just shot the film and showed it. That's exactly what I did. I'm not that different 50 years later.

The hardest thing for me about making movies, and that included 'M*A*S*H' because it was made like a movie, was starting and stopping.

The reason I wanted to start directing is that as an actor I felt I came into a job late. There's a whole team of people who have been working on it for months before you start. You have this really intense period of filming and then you leave it, knowing that the director will work on it for another few months.

Filmmaking is the ultimate team sport.

It's a juggernaut, yeah... but I'm not phased by making movies.

Making a movie is a long, dull process. There's a lot of waiting around.

Making a film is very hard work, and you live or die by the sword just a little bit every time you do it, but I wouldn't chuck it in.

The filmmakers always have a great level of control.

I'm anxious to make another film.

Making a film is beyond exciting. It's so exciting, it's exhausting.

I got a lot of energy from directing the film 'Ladies In Lavender.' You wonder if you have the stamina because as an actor you can lounge around the trailer during the scenes you're not in, but as a director, you're there from first thing in the morning to last thing at night every day of the week. I found it incredibly energising.

Film, for me, is in two stages. One is when I write the script more or less on my own - that's the nice bit. And then comes for me the unpleasant bit when they all go off, 100 people - actors and camera people and film and sound - and I stay away. When they go into the editing room, I come in again, and that's the bit I like.

I've been directing more and more the last few years, I find it an enjoyable challenge.

When you make your first film, there is a hell of a lot to think about, and you've got to have a gut understanding of your material.

I loved making Pure Country. It was a great learning experience for me, seeing another part of the entertainment industry.

Making movies is really hard. It's the hardest thing I've ever done.

Directing a film is a lot of work.

Well, I think every film student goes into film school thinking they want to write and direct their own movies, and they don't realize how much goes into it, and what a process it is.

You could get in rehearsals, pre-production, anything that would actually contribute to the understanding of how a film gets made. I actually find those things increase people's interest in a movie and like that better than worrying about showing the tricks behind the curtain.