Jose Padilha Quotes

I think great filmmakers will always talk in terms of storytelling. These guys were always about the story. That is how I love to talk about a film.

However much I may like to talk about or be interested in a more philosophical or moral agenda, [film] is, ultimately, about narrative. And it's about telling stories that are engaging and dramatic.

You can't rely on the acting to tell the story.

A camera is a camera, a shot is a shot, how you tell the story is the main thing.

The big nut to crack is to how to tell a story, what’s the right way to tell a particular story.

People who actually tell stories, meaning people who write novels and make feature films, don't see themselves as storytellers.

I don't just look at things as an actor. I've also written several films, so I look at it as a storyteller and I know if something worked and should have been in there for the benefit of the story and the benefit of the character.

I don't think I'm more of a screenwriter than I am a fiction writer. I'm more of a reader than a film-watcher, so I imagine that I'm not approaching fiction or films in a particularly cinematic way.

Because I come from the theater, I use the images of the theater and of movies a great deal when I write. I see the story in my head. I have to break down the outline of a story first. I have to know where I'm going. Usually I have a good beginning and a good ending, and then I think, "Now I have to find my way through it."

All of the good movies are based on how that story was told. And you cannot do it with a bad script, that's for sure, no matter who.

Directing is all about storytelling. It's not about equipment, or anything else.

The whole point of making a film is to tell a story. That seems to be forgotten. Many films today just rely on special effects and they have an explosion every five minutes. Who needs it? It's rather repetitious.

It's amazing how everyone has their different ways of working. I like hearing about that process, reading about it. I have so much appreciation for movies because I understand how hard it is to make one. There is always something I gain from watching a movie, whether it's a silly romantic comedy or an art film.

When a bunch of stuff is happening on set, you have to remember the grander purpose: you're telling a story, so you have to get to that moment, and that takes supreme focus.

To me, there are lots of different stories to tell and you usually find the best way to tell the one you are telling once you are in it.

An idea might spark an essay, but never a story.

For me, it's always filmmaker and then character and then story. They're all equally important but if you don't have a great filmmaker, you will not have a great film unless you just get lucky.

Bill Condon, I must say, may have been one of the best professional experiences of my life, collaborating with him. He, himself, is an Academy Award winning screenwriter. He is a storyteller first and foremost, so we speak the same language. We approach things always from the story.

I don't make unconventional stories; I don't make non-linear stories. I like linear storytelling a lot.

A lot of the struggle I had with movies is I really loved moments and tones and feelings in a scene, and I loved creating those, but I never really had great stories to string them together.

It's a risk, but I'm sort of ready to let go of thinking of movies as books that you can watch. The notion of, 'If I put the narrative blocks in the right order, this will solve all of my storytelling problems.' No, it won't, and you end up with little more than books on film.

If you think about it, episodic filmmaking has not been something that people have really done.

You cannot base a whole movie on just the imagery alone. It has to be the story and the characters.

There's got to be something you want to tell and that's the engine which spurs all of the work you have to do in order to create the story, but you have to love some sort of nugget of what you're telling to be a filmmaker.

It's not a film-maker's job to explain his technique, but to tell his story the best way he can.