I knew nothing about editing when I met Mr. Scorsese… Through a series of weird events, I ended up at New York University, and there was Martin Scorsese, and he had some troubles with a film I was able to fix. That’s the only reason I became a filmmaker.
I never had a desire to be a filmmaker. As a child and a teenager and in college, I was not aware of black women making films.
I’m trying to develop an approach to putting out a movie in wide release that makes some kind of economic sense for the filmmakers and the people that have a participation in the movie.
At first, I wasn’t sure whether I’d be a critic or a filmmaker, but I knew it would be something like that.
I’ve been fortunate to work with some amazing Asian filmmakers in independent film.
As a filmmaker, deep blacks are essential, and in my experience, no technology captures those attributes as well as Plasma.
There’s always been a struggle with filmmakers between art and industry, and you have to find a balance.
I think as a filmmaker my first contribution would just be to make a good movie that people would love to see and leave the theatre charged, with a sense of excitement.
In England, I’m a horror movie director. In Germany, I’m a filmmaker. In the US, I’m a bum.
And I feel that filmmakers ought to be careful with the use of 3D. Because if you look back over the decades, you see that 3D has come and gone for I don’t know how many years now.
If you’re a filmmaker, and every time you finish a film, you just naturally go, ‘Oh, I could have done so much better,’ that’s not much fun, is it, really? You might as well go pick another profession if that really is how you derive satisfaction from it.
The greatest filmmakers are not the ones who put everything in; they’re the ones who can figure things to leave out, and in doing so, invite your participation.
I’m crazy lucky. I was trying to be a filmmaker. I was doing Second City classes as a way to be creative. I was a PA for a long time. I was working as an assistant editor on ‘Iron Chef America’ when I got ‘SNL.’ It was one of those situations where you’re concentrating in one thing and the peripheral thing popped.
I landed a job at HBO, working for two years on the ‘The Alzheimer’s Project,’ which aired in May 2009. I was fortunate to work with a great mentor, producer John Hoffman, and the amazing doc filmmaker Susan Froemke.
I consider myself as a director’s actor, so I’m open to work with filmmakers from across the country and even abroad.
You must live life in its very elementary forms. The Mexicans have a very nice word for it: pura vida. It doesn’t mean just purity of life, but the raw, stark-naked quality of life. And that’s what makes young people more into a filmmaker than academia.
You know, I feel like my job is to write a book. Then filmmakers come and they make a movie. And they’re two really different art forms.
When I discovered European filmmakers, it affected me so deeply. It redefined what cinema could be. I mean, ‘Blow-Up’ ends with a dead body and mimes playing tennis. What?
The need to look behind the curtain is great for a filmmaker. But whether you want to deconstruct what you like as a viewer, what you like and don’t like, I wish we could let films stand on their own a little bit.
I always like to work with really good filmmakers and really good actors.
If you think you are a filmmaker… make a film, and then show it. You need to be able to finish what you started so it is presentable. When you screen it and see if your film has an effect on an audience, you will understand what it means to be a filmmaker.
A lot of independent filmmakers are really catty.
I’m a fool for a brilliant filmmaker. And for someone who wants to try new things.
My dad’s a filmmaker, and my mom’s an actress. She was the original understudy, actually, for Harper in ‘Angels in America’ and did the show for about several months while she was pregnant with my older brother. And so I grew up obsessed with film and filmmaking.
With the Ford Foundation grant all of a sudden instead of being an artist that had made a couple of short films, I became a filmmaker who dabbled in the arts.
As a European filmmaker, you can not make a genre film seriously. You can only make a parody.
Filmmakers and artists always thrive during more liberal times.
I think, as a filmmaker, you’re always responsible for your film.
Filmmakers, they tell me they want to make movies. I say, ‘Good, go out, buy a $500 camera, get some friends and make a movie. Don’t go to Hollywood. Stay wherever you are.’
I would tell filmmakers: ‘Don’t just be seduced by the same old, same old. There are interesting things you can explore that may get your film out there to audiences better than the traditional distribution mechanisms.’
Genre expectations can kill creativity. If you do something different, it will get hated. The best filmmakers can do everything on the approval list and knock it out of the park. For me, I have a hard time being creative when I have to color in between the lines.
I was, and am, a frustrated filmmaker and film student, and my passion and love for movies was so broad that, in the earlier part of my career, I stumbled into doing ‘Sports Night’ and was a comedy director.
When you are doing music videos through the ’90s, which I did, and the 2000s, you were put in the position, really, as an independent filmmaker. You were being financed by a major record company or a minor record company or whatever.
Tribeca Film Festival Doha will promote Middle Eastern themes and filmmakers, but not exclusively. Approximately 40 films will be presented at the new Museum of Islamic Art and in cinemas across Doha. Innovative work by established filmmakers will be shown alongside the debuts of newly discovered directing talents.
There are so many talented filmmakers, but they find it difficult to put their content out to the viewer.
I’m a much better filmmaker than painter. But studying it did make me visually acute and taught me lessons like being economic: Say something once and you don’t have to say it again.
I didn’t know anybody who was a filmmaker – there was no film industry where I grew up. I never knew what a director really did until I was in high school and I started reading up about it. I’ve always loved films, and I always felt like a storyteller.
‘Meek’s Cutoff’ by Kelly Reichardt – it’s beautifully shot. It’s a complex story. The filmmaker gave a very patient and feminine touch to a story that takes place during a period of history that’s very masculine, without losing any of the unforgiving harshness of the reality where the characters found themselves in.
I always wanted to be a filmmaker and became one through sheer single-mindedness. I came to filmmaking from a background in graphic design. I went to film school at Newcastle Polytechnic.
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.
I hope I can be a filmmaker where every movie will be different, and not make one type of movie. I’m always looking for a character that interests me.
I’m actually part of a number of minorities. I grew up being a horribly awkward kid. A terrible student. And now I find myself as a filmmaker, and you feel kind of alone in the world because you’re separate from everyone else.
Working with Ridley is working with one of the great filmmakers and one of the great raconteurs. You know, it’s like, a dinner with Ridley Scott or a dinner with Martin Scorsese? You just want to cut your arm off to get those.
My style of songwriting is influenced by cinema. I’m a frustrated filmmaker. A fan once said to me, ‘Girl, you make me see pictures in my head!’ and I took that as a great compliment. That’s exactly my intention.
It’s only the filmmaker. The script is really, really second. And there’s a huge gap between filmmaker and script for me. I almost don’t care about the story that they’re telling; I really only care about who wants to tell it.
Following a pre-cellphone world of children on an adventure is incredibly appealing for me. These are the kinds of movies I fell in love with and made me want to be a filmmaker in the first place.
I knew I needed to make a studio film – not for any financial reason, but because, as a filmmaker, and especially as a female filmmaker, you have to break through the glass ceiling.
I don’t think I’m all that twisted in my life. I’m not like some tattooed filmmaker who, you know, hangs out on the Lower East Side and is part of some satanic cult or something.
I’d made these experimental films but I thought the major chore of a filmmaker was to relate to actors.
If the goal is to get the best artists, actors, and filmmakers in the world to create the best movies, Hollywood does a decent job. And I think no one would disagree with me that it also makes a ton of bad movies and employs a bunch of hacks.
Being a filmmaker in the digital platform has given me complete creative control. I can make what I want, when I want. I don’t have to wait to book an audition.
Instincts are a really important guide for any artist, but particularly filmmakers because it takes a lot to stay true to your instincts as a storyteller.
I think every filmmaker has his way of working, and I respect that.
