Norman McLaren Quotes

People say I pay too much attention to the look of a movie but for God's sake, I'm not producing a Radio 4 Play for Today, I'm making a movie that people are going to look at.

There's one thing which I hate about color films... people who use up a lot of their despairing producer's money by working in the laboratory to bring out the dominant hues, or to make color films where there isn't any color.

And then we watched an amazing number of movies from the late '60s and '70s, which is my favorite time, and we studied their camera movements, their stocks, the way they lit stuff, the colors they used.

My principal job is to make interesting and entertaining films, and I'm not proud of which format or which particular technique I use. I just wanted the film to look good.

I took courses at USC in film editing and art direction and photography when I was still in high school.

Every film deserves its own unique look.

The color grading in 'Peaky' is a huge, huge element of the show's distinctive style, you know?

I never really understood how movies were made, because it was such a technical accomplishment.

A movie that I'm involved with and have a lot of love for, which is 'On The Road,' does use a lot of handheld. It can be done beautifully. I'm proud of that. It's a very beautiful movie.

Italian cameramen grow up immersed in an awareness of light. It is part of their mythology.

I will not cut my film because, because, because, because of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

Film is a dramatised reality and it is the director's job to make it appear real... an audience should not be conscious of technique.

I don't look at rushes, or I don't go to the dailies. I don't even really look at playback... unless it's an action scene or a move that I need to do better, something like that.

I'm one of the guys who wants to watch the film completely done, with special effects, sound and music, because I tend to get disappointed if I watch it not fully done.

It's more interesting because you get to research the history of the period, and all the different aesthetic elements that make a film, particularly this film, so stunning.

I've heard it said many times, 'Let's work on the look of the film,' but that doesn't work with me.

An effective found footage movie is much harder to make than an effective traditionally shot movie. A crappy one is much easier to make because you take your camera, and you shoot the scene, and you're done. But to make it effective, they're actually much trickier.

There are so many things from movies that are remembered, that are just looks on people's faces or incredible vistas or beautiful pictures. That is a very important part of cinema.

I don't know how you can tell a good actor in the movies. I really don't. I think you simply just do the part and hope to God that the director has a good cutter and a good editor, and it'll all get cut and put together so that you look good in it.

Obviously, the cinematography of films is art, just as a still shot can be art. If I'm watching a Wes Anderson movie, the colour palettes alone, and the way they're painted, could be art. With music, you're a little bit limited, of course, because it's only audio.

Cinematography is so much about instinct and intuition - you want the same range of experience going into behind the camera as what you see in front of it. Your life experience will come through the lens.

Certain things work on paper held together with staples. Comics use bright colors to make things leap off the page, but movies are a different medium.

Visually, I'm always considering shots and composition quite a lot, and I love putting art into films, and I do a lot of the art.

If you go into a studio without a set effectively, you've got a blue screen. As a DP you have to light it of what you think it should look like. You don't have any reference of what the background looks like. You might have some concepts, but effectively you're lighting it as what you think it should look like.

I've always wanted to keep my foot in film as well as theatre and be working in both worlds.