Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
If we make films only for the frontbenchers, we can't make money. Hence, we have to make it for a majority audience. As my films are mass films, I deal with emotions in raw form - they are not subtle. I don't mind being branded. That does not mean I like only those kinds of films.
Films are dreams. Many, many critics say to me that my films are not good because they are too unbelievable, but this is my style. I tell stories like they are dreams. This is my imagination. For me, it would be impossible to do a film that is so precise, that resembles real life.
I watch films, so I know what it is to be there in a theatre as the audience. So I always want to communicate with them when I make films, but that is not the only thing. I also want to say something which I feel deeply, and which I feel I can connect with the rest of the audience.
The terms of copyright last far too long: either the life of the author plus 70 years after death for a personal work or 95 years for a corporate work. That length doesn't encourage more authorship - it merely limits the speakers who could share powerful speeches, books, and films.
When I meet fans who relate to Korean films and dramas even though they don't understand the language or the culture, and when they talk about studying Korean and traveling to Korea because of those films and dramas, I think to myself that this is the true force of the Hallyu wave.
One of the things I've discovered at my age is I must have enchantment. And that was not clear to me in my earlier years. When I look at my favorite films, the Frank Capra - even Scorsese, even 'Goodfellas,' what makes that movie so remarkable is there's enchantment in their world.
I am writing a book called 'The History of Australia in Hundred Objects.' It's of things we have invented in Australia. And you know, some of them are amazing. We invented the clapper boards used in films. We invented those cranes - those big long cranes used on construction sites.
I think one of my favorite things to do is just lock myself up in a small room and listen to music and watch films for a day. Also I just like seeing my friends. We have pizza parties which means I get four friends round, we eat a pizza and we're really lazy and we play PlayStation.
If we didn't want to upset anyone, we would make films about sewing, but even that could be dangerous. But I think finally, in a film, it is how the balance is and the feelings are. But I think there has to be those contrasts and strong things within a film for the total experience.
Telugu-Tamil producer Thyagarajan has bought the South Indian language rights for two Hindi hit films, Vikas Behl's 'Queen' and Neeraj Pandey's 'Special 26.' He wants me to play Akshay Kumar's role in the Telugu version of 'Special 26.' Akshay and I even look similar, physique-wise.
I feel that, in India, we have films that have tackled various issues over the years, but perhaps one of the issues that we've tackled less is the issue of caste-ism. That's an issue we've more or less stayed away from... although we touched on it briefly in some films like 'Lagaan.'
Much before I entered films, my dad walked into my room and saw me busy drawing something at 3 A.M. He stood there for some time and said, 'Whatever career choice you make, you are going to be successful.' I'll never forget those words. It gave me the confidence to be who I am today.
'Baahubali' was a film that was never done before. Rajamouli sir was my biggest inspiration because he lives in the smallest house and drives the smallest cars, but he makes the biggest films ever. He taught me the art of analysing your own strengths, and I take inspiration from him.
Fundamentally, I always find that most of the films that I've put out are essentially the director's cut. Part of the process with a director's cut is the leaving behind of certain aspects of the movie that we don't feel necessary because they aren't part of the dynamic of the story.
I visited an asylum to observe expressions of the mentally disturbed and to get my body language right for the blind girl's role. I visited the blind school, read the autobiography of Helen Keller, and watched a number of films from 'Scent of a Woman' to 'Anurag,' 'Fanaa' and 'Black.'
I am honored to be one of this year's Urbanworld ambassadors for the festival's 20th anniversary, joining my friend David Oyelowo. I have always had a special relationship with Urbanworld, back to my days as a festival publicist to previewing my earlier films and now as an ambassador.
Yes I have made a lot of money and I have a lot of respect, my films have done well, and I know there are loads of loads of people who look up to me and really love me. I really just thought this is like a strange dream. I have never thought this is a success - I don't have a standard.
Sometimes you can't fight change, because you're a part of it, and I feel that in the context of these films that are happening now, there is a kind of change coming in terms of how history is represented on film, and the African, and the African-American and British African experience.
Jack Palance was my distant uncle - that's the family gossip. Growing up, my family knew everything about his face getting burned and scarred in the military and how that mutilation led him to become such a famous 'heavy' in films. I prayed for good scars of my own. Not just acne scars.
I was very young, and I was on vacation with my family, and there was a retrospective of old films, and one of them was 'The Phantom of the Opera' with Claude Rains that was in color. It was something very important for my career because I began to follow these stories that were morbid.
I just watch movies I like over and over. It seems to be a lot of sci-fi stuff. My favorites are probably - besides the first two 'Alien' films, I watch '2001', I watch 'Star Wars', the first ones, because those actually had a huge effect on me as well, 'Empire Strikes Back' especially.
Let's get a couple of things straight. It hasn't been years and years since I made a movie. I'm not coming back from the dead - I've just had two kids! I have no intention of retiring, but I do think it's impossible to do movie after movie, because there aren't that many good films made.
If you mentioned Hanna-Barbera to people, they said, 'Oh yeah, Flintstone, Yogi, Scooby-Doo, Jetsons,' and that was pretty much it. We have characters with very high recognition factors and great films, but no organized plans for really making the most of them and increasing their value.
On one level, of course, the notion of judging films or books or music against each other is completely ridiculous. Who's to say '12 Years A Slave' is a better film than 'The Wolf of Wall Street'? Or that one album in a certain genre is better than another in a completely different genre?
Films are not the sole area in my life. Films are a passion. But it's not like I'll die if I don't get another movie. I'll grow, I'll flourish, I'll learn something new, but I'll always do something that I like. If I get the right film, I'll do it. I will not compromise for anything else.
I am so picky about what films I get myself into because it's such an explosion of energy and commitment once you get in there, you destroy your life until you deliver these films. I never want to be in the position of making films that won't be a great use of 90 minutes of someone's life.
Exploitation films were famous for taking an issue an exploiting it because they could move much faster than a studio could. If there was any hot topic, they would run out and make a quick movie and make a buck on it, by changing it around and using it, in some way, to give some relevance.
While not my personal favorite of the Disney princess films, 'The Little Mermaid' wins hands-down in my book for best Disney adaptation. Little girls waited for more than 150 years for Hans Christian Andersen's 'The Little Mermaid' to have a happy ending. Walt Disney finally gave it to her.
I am a filmmaker. My job is to make films. When something excites you - a story or characterisation - you immediately forget about everything else. You only think how to make a movie out of it. The economics come only later. You shouldn't let money dictate the kind of films you should make.
I'm a Sufi Muslim, I would say. I believe in using the medium to create a good vibration because art is so important to society. Some projects I don't do because I feel that it's going to create a bad vibe. I don't do propaganda films that are anti another religion, anti-Muslim or anti-Hindu.
If you really love films, and you really want to get the full impact, there's a huge difference between watching something on a small screen with a mediocre sound system and watching it on a giant screen in a giant theater with a huge beautiful sound system. I mean, the difference is electric.
When I did 'Bird,' it was a surprise to some people, first because I wasn't in it and second because most of the films I'd been doing were cop movies or westerns or adventure films, so to be doing one about Charlie Parker, who was a great influence on American music, was a great thrill for me.
It is important to keep the filmmakers interested in you so they can offer you everything and anything. We actors are not given work on the basis of audience poll; the filmmaker will cast you after they see and like your work. It is essential to do different kind of films and not get typecast.
I've been a big believer in musicians turned actor, going back to Sinatra winning the Oscar for 'From Here To Eternity.' David Bowie in 'Man Who Fell to Earth,' Kris Kristofferson's been great in a bunch of films. Liza Minnelli, Barbra Streisand, Mariah Carey, I thought was great in 'Precious.'
When I first envisioned 'Funny Games' in the mid-1990s, it was my intention to have an American audience watch the movie. It is a reaction to a certain American cinema, its violence, its naivety, the way American cinema toys with human beings. In many American films, violence is made consumable.
I'm a huge fan of Greta Gerwig, and working with her was also a dream come true. She was one of those directors who, when people asked me, 'Who do you wanna work with one day?' I'd say Greta Gerwig. I've always been a fan of mumblecore and her films, and so to work with her was just so much fun.
'Pulp Fiction' was probably one of the first films I ever saw that really kind of took effect on me. I was about four years old - obviously wasn't supposed to be seeing that film; my sister kind of sneaked it out and we got to see it. She's older than me. That was something I always used to watch.
Christopher Nolan's astounding third Batman feature, 'The Dark Knight Rises,' represents the true maturation of the superhero movie - and provides the key to understanding the bottomless craving moviegoers have for these films, 34 years after the Christopher Reeve Superman gave birth to the genre.
It was no accident that I made 'Hoop Dreams' because it concerned a sport that I loved and hoped would be my dream, however far-fetched that turned out to be. Because of the success of that film, Hollywood pigeonholed me as a sports biopic guy, which led to 'Prefontaine' and two cable sports films.
You become very angry and depressed that you keep getting offered only these exceedingly demure and repressed roles. They're so not me. That's why films like Fight Club were so important to me because I think I confounded certain stereotypes and limited perceptions of what I could do as an actress.
I went through a phase of deep introspection. I realised that while doing films back to back, I was getting burnt out and not concentrating on quality. I wasn't preparing for my role and was working like a machine. When I saw the result on the big screen, I felt that the work I'd done was horrible.
In 'Thor,' that was my own hair. I grew it out. But I have naturally curly, blonde hair, so I'll never look like that. By the time I got to 'The Avengers,' I had come off two other films, which required me to have it very short. So I dyed it again and it was long enough to use a part of my hairline.
I love character-driven, well-written, great storytelling types of films, and I think that 'My Cousin Vinny' just hit the nail on the head with everything. It's one of those movies that, if I'm flipping through the channels, no matter what part it's on, I can watch it. It's just one of my favorites.
I'm baffled when young actors aren't familiar with current film, television and theater, or aren't interested in older films or plays and the history of the craft in general. If you don't know what's out there, and what came before, then how can you picture yourself working, and how can anyone else?
Films are not mathematics - that's the first thing you need to understand. At least, that's how I feel. They are not words on paper. Films are made with people, with teams and with individual bundles of creativity coming together to fulfill the vision of an individual who is the director of the film.
When 'Pizza' released, I was a nobody. Initially, we managed to get only 100 screens. But, after its success, the producers of 'Naduvula Konjam Pakkatha Kaanom' got 150 screens and also released the film in the U.S. Now, distributors are keen to invest in my films because they feel I have face value.
I don't think I'm the world's most die-hard sci-fi fan, but I definitely grew up watching 'Star Trek' religiously - all of them: the original, 'Next Generation,' 'Deep Space Nine,' 'Voyager.' I think sci-fi has an important place in the cinema world. Fantasy is a big part of why films actually exist.
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.
Not only have I made films about the subject, but I've largely funded them on my own, so I'm fully committed to doing whatever I can to change the audience's respect and appreciation for the ocean. In 100 years I want whales, dolphins and sharks to still be around, and the ocean to be a healthier place.
I want to do Hindi films, but a proper one and a good production. I'm even open to multi-starrers because those work better in Bollywood. But it should be with only Bollywood technicians, not the South Indian team. There's no point to my going to Bollywood if I work with the same artistes and technicians.