Robert Towne Quotes

There's always so much more that can be conveyed on screen visually in the expressions of people's faces, in their bodies, in their body language. And also with sound design, with music.

I don't need dialogue to convey emotion or thoughts to my audience.

Breathing is always key in any character. When you have a character with no voice, that makes it even more important.

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said.

As much as movies are about the words that you're saying, they're also about what's not said, the silent moments.

I'm obsessed with subtexts. I love that we often don't say what we feel. That gap between the two. I like it when actors reveal a lot without having to say it.

Your internal dialogue has got to be different from what you say. And, you know, in film, hopefully that registers and speaks volumes. It's always the unspoken word and what's happening behind someone's eyes that makes it so rich.

There is a tendency to underestimate the power of what we can do without words. Sometimes you can make a scene even more powerful and precise without dialogue.

There is this miraculous thing I heard Hugh Grant talking about - the thing about screen acting is that you can read people's thoughts. You are trying to register something inside and usually the eyes in cinema are where you will register that.

It's almost better most times to not talk in a scene. I think you can actually express a lot more without words.

I like acting with no lines because all of a sudden you're able to express things without always worrying about the text. It's great to have a great text, but there's a lot of stuff you can't say in words, and I think there's something really nice about good physical moments.

I'm a very physical actor; everything I do is pretty much body-oriented. I sometimes am able to deliver information just with a look; my face does two or three different things, and it says it all.

I watched season four of 'The Wire.' They have subtle performances that they do through their eyes. You could watch season four with the audio off and still understand what's happening through their eyes.

In a Western, you talk more with your eyes and your actions than you do with big speeches. I love that.

Acting is very physical, even when it doesn't appear to be. It's about the arc of your body's language through a film.

When making documentaries, the most important thing I learned was to listen, observe gestures and facial expressions.

I am spoken to not in words, which come to me quaint and veiled, but in signs, in conformations of face and hands, in postures of shoulders and feet, in nuances of tune and tone, in gaps and absences whose grammar has never been recorded.

The emoji still doesn't really speak to the complexity that actually - or the subtext that goes on between when people actually speak face-to-face.

As the language of the face is universal, so 'tis very comprehensive; no laconism can reach it: 'Tis the short hand of the mind, and crowds a great deal in a little room

I love watching people listen. And on film often some of the best moments if you think about favorite moments on film, often the person isn't even talking.

There is a form of communication that transcends the power of words.

I like actors that are good with pantomime and that can transmit a lot by their presence and attitude more than through their dialogue.

Some of the best actors in the world are very exterior actors, Anthony Hopkins being one of them. He knows exactly how to turn his face to get a certain expression. He knows exactly what to do with eyes, and with his voice. It's very exterior.

One of my favorite actors is Paul Newman. He could tell so much with a single look, whereas some actors would need an entire five page monologue to give off the feeling of what he could say with just a single look.

You can convey a lot of emotion with just some eyebrows and mouth movement.