Artistic Filmmaking Quotes

Louis Malle was the best filmmaker I've ever worked with. He was such an artist. He was dealing with the theme of innocence and experience.

I like movies where you can come back and re-watch them and admire the cinematography 25 years later.

The first time I saw 'Sunset Boulevard' I was probably eight or nine years old, and it really struck me how it's so simply put and elegant, yet there's so much going on.

Asian horror is really setting a trend. The Pang brothers are from Hong Kong, so they just bring a whole different sensibility to a horror movie. In Hong Kong, they're actually doing stuff that's very artistic and pushing boundaries.

Serious films for grown-ups - 'Michael Clayton,' 'In the Valley of Elah,' 'A Mighty Heart' - these are big Hollywood films, but they have substance and craft and really beautiful performances.

The film of tomorrow will not be directed by civil servants of the camera, but by artists for whom shooting a film constitutes a wonderful and thrilling adventure.

At its best, MTV puts a face to the names, if you know what I mean. I think if you can take the expression of a song much farther, that's great. And it's one of the only outlets there is for artistic filmmaking. But it's a double-edged sword. At it's worst, MTV is just a lot of TV commercials for songs.

It is true that language and forward movement in the cinema are jolly hard to reconcile. It's a very, very, difficult thing to do. […] There is still a place in the cinema for movies that are driven by the human face, and not by explosions and cars and guns and action sequences…there's such a thing as action and speed within thought rather than within a ceaseless milkshake of images.

The kind of filmmaking excitement that director Peter Weir brings to movies is bone deep.

I love low-budget projects with great acting and great stories you can really get your teeth into.

I think there's escapist moviemaking, and we want to be captivated and taken away. If it's done right, you can craft an incredible film. There have been superhero films that I think are brilliant pieces of art.

The message films that try to be message films always fail. Likewise with documentaries. The documentaries that work best are the ones that eschew a simple message for an odd angle. I found that one of the most spectacular films about the Middle East was 'Waltz With Bashir,' or 'The Gatekeepers,' or '5 Broken Cameras.'

People talk about making art films - experimental films. I can make an art film every day of the week. Nothing to it. What's difficult is to combine a commercial film with art.

I don't like these commercial films I do. I'd far prefer to do more artistic films, more cult films.

I came from a very avant-garde documentary kind of film making world. I like cinema verité, documentaries. I liked non-story, non-character tone poems. And that's the film making that I was interested in.

I love French films, and European films. They're not any bigger, but there's just a sort of definition, and a confidence, and strength to them. I'd always, given the option, go and see a French drama. Obviously, we probably get the better ones. But they're just sophisticated on many levels, and grown up, and quite profound - and we don't make films like that.