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Quotes by Director

"The music of the most popular operas is so highly esteemed, it can stand endless revivals."

"I'm going to do an adaptation of the Italian film, Bread and Tulips. I really like that film."
Film,

"I sought Ben Affleck because I needed an everyman for this role. Ben appeals to men and women. He gives you a sense of intelligence, the notion of a guy who can think on his feet."

"Fortunately, somewhere between chance and mystery lies imagination, the only thing that protects our freedom, despite the fact that people keep trying to reduce it or kill it off altogether."

"I was frustrated because I couldn't get going, as I was trying to figure out how to make films. I had various jobs, I taught a SAT class, I was a bartender, I had a day job at an office and was making short films."

"Oh yeah, I believe in God. I think there's much more evidence that there is a God than that there isn't. I don't believe that Mother Theresa and Hitler go to the same place."

"Whenever I arrive on a real location, I have to move around and work out what the best angles are going to be. When I was moving around with the lens, I discovered things that the naked eye would not have."

"Sometimes when we weep in the movies we weep for ourselves or for a life unlived. Or we even go to the movies because we want to resist the emotion that's there in front of us. I think there is always a catharsis that I look for and that makes the movie experience worthwhile."

"Something stopped me in school a little bit. Anything that I'm not interested in, I can't even feign interest."

"I read, therefore I'm interested in writers."

"If you're sitting in your minivan, playing your computer animated films for your children in the back seat, is it the animation that's entertaining you as you drive and listen? No, it's the storytelling. That's why we put so much importance on story. No amount of great animation will save a bad story."

"I had a heartbreaking experience when I was 9. I always wanted to be a guard. The most wonderful girl in the world was a guard. When I got polio and then went back to school, they made me a guard. A teacher took away my guard button."

"I have gotten to a point in my life where I don't want to have dinner with someone I don't like."

"Nerves provide me with energy... It's when I don't have them, when I feel at ease, that's when I get worried."

"But also, there are no films being made about Afghanistan."

"What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet."

"The Buddhas had to be destroyed by the Taliban to get the world thinking about Afghanistan."

"All directors are storytellers, so the motivation was to tell the story I wanted to tell. That's what I love."

"It is essential to do everything possible to attract young people to opera so they can see that it is not some antiquated art form but a repository of the most glorious music and drama that man has created."

"Everybody has the ability to be manipulative, to be hateful and deceitful."

"We have too many intellectuals who are afraid to use the pistol of common sense."

"I'm not against the police; I'm just afraid of them."

"It's everything and I always make decisions about the cast."

"My best male friend is my best friend until he crosses me. We're all protective of the self."

"But I really am very active in the choice of the line producer with the producer of record and the distributing company, because I've had some terrible, terrible experiences with some line producers, particularly in cable."

"While the eyes of the world will be on us let's show everyone that we have a great sense of humour."

"I worked at a local television station and I got a chance to direct and do all those things - worked kiddie shows, Ranger House show with the hand puppets and things like that."

"Films can only be made by by-passing the will of those who appear in them, using not what they do, but what they are."
Will,

"So I've had really great assistant directors for my last seven movies."

"All I know is that I operate by going out to each of them and trying to learn the territory in which they operate. My language to each of them has to suit their brain."

"What you do, is you gradually become more and more experienced, and more and more realistic about dramatic tolerance, i.e. about how long the play should be."
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