Jonathan Demme Quotes

Documentaries - my God, there is so much going on in our country and in the world today that every time you open the newspaper or turn on the radio or watch the news on TV there is another documentary subject. We're getting the headlines for a second, shaped by corporate delivery most of the time, but what's really the story there?

I do a lot of reading of news so I can be smarter, and I do a lot of watching TV news so I can know why Americans aren't very smart. Then I can point out the hypocrisy of politicians or the media.

Modern young news consumers want not only to know what happened but why it happened.

There are always issues on the front page that need to be explored.

I'm not sophisticated when it comes to politics, when it comes to journalism.

Part of my job is to read the paper, watch C-Span and show things that haven't been shown or were buried.

We have a responsibility to show the public the kinds of truths that they don't see on the TV news or the Hollywood film.

Choosing how you vote should not be a snap verdict based on a few minutes of television.

I'd always been a news junkie, always read lots of newspapers and watched the Sunday morning news shows on TV and felt strongly about issues of power, control, sexuality and race.

Yeah, I don't deal with current events or pop culture, and I avoid politics like the plague.

So no one should rely on television either for their knowledge of music or for news. There's just more going on. It's an adjunct to the written word, which I think is still the most important thing.

It is precisely the purpose of the public opinion generated by the press to make the public incapable of judging, to insinuate into it the attitude of someone irresponsible, uninformed.

Most people see through these issues but the corporate media doesn't reflect these sentiments.

I think they are paying a lot more attention to news now, by the way, in part because of national-security issues. A lot of young people have friends or family in the military today.

I just happen to believe that people are not stupid. And the way I will come at it is to educate people, help people to actually understand that it is that progressive movement that is causing them the problems.

We are living in a time in which movies such as 'Super Size Me' and 'An Inconvenient Truth' have made box-office history, and books such as 'No Logo' and my own, 'The Silent Takeover,' are bestsellers.

Many people have their reputations as reporters and analysts because they are on television, batting around conventional wisdom. A lot of these people have never reported a story.

I just feel like, with rappers, there's so much complacency. It's like, 'Oh, I'm a rapper. I'm successful. I make money. That's all that matters.' But there's a lot of stuff going on in the world. Whether or not you're aware of it, it's happening.

When I hear so-called professional journalists ask why we have celebrities speak for us and for the animals, the environment or social causes, I marvel at their denial of the rules of their own trade.

We talk about the influence of the media on public opinion. But reality has some influence on public opinion too.

I don't think the intelligence reports are all that hot. Some days I get more out of New York Times.

I don't feel that I'm particularly political. I'm interested in politics; I'll express my view if I feel strongly about something, but humanitarian issues, I think, are slightly different.

I've always been interested in the news, but I've always been interested in what's popular. I've always had a little bit of a populist take on things. Which I know is interesting when you talk about Donald Trump.

I want to educate people and deliver news that isn't just surrounded by Charlie Sheen. I'd like to be able to do the serious stuff in conjunction with the comedy.

I got 'The Red White and Blue' out of journalism. It puts you in touch with the world.