Documentary Impact Quotes

I think 'Gasland' is the doorway for a lot of people to see something happening in their backyard and realize the national and global implications.

I made 'Bowling for Columbine' in the hope the school shootings would stop and that we would address the issue of how easy it is to get a gun in the United States, and tragically, those school shootings continue.

I watched a TV documentary about how animals are farmed, killed and prepared for us to eat. I saw all those cows and pigs and realized I couldn't be a part of it any more. It was horrible. I did some research to make sure I could still obtain enough protein to fight and, once satisfied that I could, I stopped. I'll never go back.

Interestingly enough, I feel what the show [OJ Simpson] was able to accomplish in a really masterful way is that White America could look back on the show and the documentary and say, "We understand why Black people were effusive at the acquittal of O.J. Simpson."

I don't go to McDonald's anymore. After I saw Super Size Me... no way!

I feel like a lot of funders of documentaries today want to fund films that have a social message that is going to yield results.

Do not tell somebody how to vote, just go up to them and tell them what Fahrenheit 9/11 meant to you. Fahrenheit will probably not win an Academy Award, but if you put it first on your list, it will become a nominee.

I think it was a modest thing I did (Fahrenheit 9/11) ... this is an election year ... I'm not telling them how to vote. I'm saying get information about the issues ... at first there's just silence, then there's 'Yeah!' and then there's 'Boo' ... I have never seen a reaction like this, in all my years of touring ... Clear Channel can't threaten to not play my records because they are not going to play them anyway.

You can't hope for a better result as a campaigner than to have the prime minister announce a major policy change within 48 hours of your documentary.

Documentaries are a powerful and effective way of bridging the gap between worlds, breaking through to new audiences that wouldn't otherwise be engaged - in essence, not preaching to the choir.

I could do a thousand documentaries on poverty and poor people that would be watched by a handful of the convinced, but I was never really going to have an influence on my times -- (as I might if I develop Sesame Street).

I saw this documentary he did years ago called 'Fade to Black.' I was always a Jay Z fan - I liked Jay Z - but after I saw that documentary, I loved Jay Z. I realized how intelligent he was.

After 'An Inconvenient Truth' came out, a lot of people came to me with their causes, and there are a lot - water, poverty, and so many, many more.

After making the 'Occupy' movie, when you finish watching the film, you want to take a hot shower. You want to go home and shower because you've just spent an hour and fifteen minutes with the greasiest, dirtiest people you will ever see.

'The Act of Killing' helped catalyze this basic transformation in how the media talks about the past.

Most people see a documentary about the meat industry and then they become a vegetarian for a week.

Reality television hasn't killed documentaries, because there are so many great documentaries still being made, but it certainly has changed the landscape.

I mean, "The Jinx" is an amazing piece of cinema and amazing television moment, it's rare documentarians can feel the direct impact of their work.

Documentaries make a difference.

I was watching a Storyville documentary called 'Blackfish' about killer whales in captivity. I was emotionally drained by the end. It revealed a real behind-the-scenes truth on what we do with animals.

Documentaries shouldn't just reflect the world: they should try and explain why reality is like it is.

Truth is a pursuit, it's a quest. And proof is certainly in the pudding in this particular instance, because the film, and the evidence accumulated in making the film, led to this man's release from prison. And that's hardly ever happened, if it's happened at all, in any other film that I can think of.

I hope that not only my documentaries, but everybody's documentaries, last. It will really confuse historians in the next century, because they'll have, in addition to all the print material, they'll have all these pictures to look at.

It had an enormous impact to the point of the United Nations passing a resolution against the killing and hunting of these whales as they are an endangered species. This was a documentary on the plight of the whales.

'How to Survive a Plague' is history-telling at its best. It's a film I'll show my two children, now toddlers, when they are old enough to understand. It's a movie that I cannot forget.