Filmmaking Skill Quotes

To be a director, you have to think you're the best. Ever since I went to film school, I imagined that you have to think deep down that you want to be Martin Scorsese or you want to be P.T. Anderson. Like, am I as good as those guys? Absolutely not. I feel like I keep learning, and I feel like I keep getting better.

If you ask me whether I can direct, I can. In fact, I have shot several songs, scenes and stunts. When certain directors of my movies were not able to be there for some reason and had asked me to help out, I have directed. But to helm an entire movie is a different art altogether.

My early films look terrible! I didn't know what I was doing. I learned when I was doing it. I never went to film school.

If you just love movies enough, you can make a good one.

There’s always been this hocus-pocus or magical, mystical thing associated with the making of film that sort of psyches people out and makes them think that this cannot be done; that this is a craft that cannot be learned.

I can't really remember my life without movies... [Growing up in Hollywood] is no different really. I make movies the same way other kids play tennis or go to piano lessons. I'm trying to get better at what I want to do, just like other kids are trying to get better at what they want to do.

I don't attribute any 'luck' to 'Bol Bachchan''s success. It was an entertaining commercial film which was bound to do well, and I guess I have the knack of picking up such universally appealing, fun masala movies which turn to be successful.

If we're going to be considered horror filmmakers, we have to prove it not only to ourselves but to the audience that we can actually make something scary.

Terry Gilliam, he's a really interesting and amazing film maker, and when he gets it right, it's really powerful stuff.

One thing which no one knows about me is I could be very good director. Although I have not directed any movie so far but I am sure the day I start it, I would be very good at it.

I get really excited when I see filmmakers make something that is subtle and feels real. It is really tough to do right.

You have to remain strong. That's the kind of filmmaker I want to encourage. Orson Welles was the one who said, you know, you can learn anything you need to know about filmmaking- that's camera, sound, celluloid, video at this point- in four hours. It has nothing to do with anything. It has nothing to do with it... It has to do with what you want to say. If you feel you have something to say, you'll find that way to get it said, on film, and not let anyone or anything chip away at that or tarnish it, because it's something special and precious.

I've worked with a lot of real heavy hitters, and Quentin is maybe heads and shoulders, at least a forehead, above just about anybody I've ever worked with.

The great directors, I've learned, have a great sense of rhythm.

Do you imagine Sergio Leone with a philosophy? Come on! He was a primitive of movies, a great director on set.

'Crazy Rich Asians' and 'A Simple Favor' were each a master class in filmmaking, and I had so much fun working with all my costars.

But actually I make films that I think are extremely sophisticated and cinematic.

It's not really that I'm interested in filmmaking. I'm interested in the instrument of it, you know.

What attracted me to 'Eclipse' was that it is a great story and a tremendous challenge for me as a filmmaker.

I think maybe making films is something innate you can't really teach to begin with.

As a filmmaker, you've got to have a nose for what's going on culturally. You have to feel it. It doesn't have to be manga or music, but you need some kind of antenna. That's very important.

I can understand that an audience, buying a ticket to see a picture of mine, wants to see something funny because they feel confident that at least I have a fighting chance to make a funny film when I make a film, whereas if I make a dramatic film there's one chance in a thousand that it's really going to come out great, so I understand how they feel about that and they're completely right.

When I think about directing a film, the thing that stops me short is wondering if I'm a natural at it the way I think you, and PTA, and Fincher are born directors. Maybe some people's talent is in understanding the ways that film communicates, without dialogue, without plot.

They call David O. Russell the actor whisperer because he can get stuff out of actors that maybe some other directors can't.

I don't consider myself to be particularly gifted in the way that other filmmakers are gifted.