Film Portrayal Quotes

I think it will be, as always, interesting to compare different portrayals of Hitchcock. I'm very honored that I'm playing the same part as Anthony Hopkins.

The bikini scenes in 'Billa' were vital because they showed me as a seductress. I'd like to say here that outfits define a character and help an actor, say, 30 per cent, the rest depends on one's histrionic skills.

I think we're very complicated and we're capable of all kinds of things, and movies don't reflect that.

Two words guided the making of 'Babel' for me: 'dignity' and 'compassion.' These things are normally forgotten in the making of a lot of films. Normally there is not dignity because the poor and dispossessed in a place like Morocco are portrayed as mere victims, or the Japanese are portrayed as cartoon figures with no humanity.

There just aren't enough positive portrayals of Latino life in film.

I'm very careful about how I portray violence in my films. I do believe that violence, especially violent video games, are not a good thing for young kids.

I think it's very refreshing to see women in cinema having strength and their own independent storyline.

Middle-class Pakistani cultural life is what I've seen, what I know - they're not all screaming faceless mullahs. It's disturbing that in American films, the character on the other side is not even named.

Julia Roberts most definitely would play me in the film of my life. Not just because of the hair but because she has all sides to her personality come through in films that I could just imagine her playing my crazy self so well.

Violence is a very ugly thing. Violence is often so casual on film, and made to look so cool and so sexy, but violence is a repulsive, repugnant act that human beings inflict on each other. It shouldn't seem to be cool and sexy, ever really.

After Blood Simple, everybody thought I was from Texas. After Mississippi Burning, everybody thought I was from Mississippi and uneducated. After Fargo, everybody's going to think I'm from Minnesota, pregnant, and have blonde hair. I don't think you can ever completely transform yourself on film, but if you do your job well, you can make people believe that you're the character you're trying to be.

OCD, we discovered is a lot of different things-it's not just washing your hands, it's whatever you're obsessed with. It can be just the way you hold a pen, and you always have to have it a certain way or you have to eat your food, it depends. It's something that, as a character I thought was really interesting because sometimes it's used in a film where it is OCD and sometimes it's strategic.

I'm just interested in all of the different ways that a woman can be. We don't have enough, when it comes to American film, that shows all of the different complexities and ways that a woman is interesting and mysterious and dynamic and really complicated.

I can't stand [female] characters that are not empowered in a certain way, or at least don't come to a conclusion at the end of the movie where they find empowerment in themselves.

Since I still think of myself as a middle class guy, people get to see that side of me in films like 'Middle Class Abbayi.'

Within the microcosm of a film you get drawn to people. There are certain projects you care enormously about, and 'The Edge Of Love' was one because I was portraying a great hero of mine, Dylan Thomas.

The beauty of Toronto is that it has not been shot a lot in movies, for itself at least. I mean, most of the time, Toronto is shot to portray something else.

For 'Hercules,' I went for the demigod look: big and mean. When you're playing a character like the son of Zeus, you only get one shot.

In terms of my looks in 'Brothers,' it's definitely not a glamourised look. It is very realistic.

To his credit John Wayne was open about it, he even portrayed a member of the House UnAmerican Activities Committee in a film called 'Big Jim McClain.'

I can't play a slave.

I'm actually a thin serious person but I play fat and funny, but only for the movies.

So often, in films, there are two ways a female can be portrayed: either innocent and virginal or the complete opposite.

I've played all kinds of historical characters, but they are stuck in movies that aren't their movies.

I love strong women in films that are allowed to play women and not male fantasies.