Non-Traditional Filmmaking Quotes

In studio films, everything has to be boxed in, everybody needs to know beforehand - this is comedy, this is sci-fi, this is drama - and what's the point of independent film if you don't get to experiment?

I want to do experimental films.

When my films don't work it's usually because I tried some very experimental idea. I tried new ideas and they just didn't work, as opposed to trying to do something conventional and having it be so conventional nobody wanted to see it.

We need less perfect but more free films.

I don't have a typical filmmaker background. I didn't grow up with a super eight camera or a video camera. I didn't start cutting movies when I was four or five.

I don't think Paul Thomas Anderson has a standard approach to anything.

I've never had a good game plan. At a certain point, making independent films became more and more appealing to me because I like freshness and originality.

Doing the Muppet Show you forget about conventional filming.

For 'Chungking Express,' the way we shot the film was all handheld and with all this existing light, and that became very popular. Everybody thought it was cool.

There are so many rules about how you make a film and so many conventions that you can and can't do. I think people have forgotten that they are just rules that were invented for convenience - sometimes it is more convenient not to obey the rules.

The traditions of Hollywood are grand and great and are going to survive forever, in a way. But they're not going to be the only way for much longer. The technology is such now that you don't have to have millions of dollars to make a movie. You can make one with a computer.

My theory is, independent movies only work if you're willing to push the material and do something different.

If you look at the types of directors out there, I'm not as weird as most of them.

You can make a film with a phone and a computer if you want, if you have the time. So it's a world that is saturated with films and all kind of stuff, so it's such a blessing to be able to make a film and people care, and even if they say that it's a bad idea, at least they care and they're talking about it.