I think that every minority in the United States of America knows everything about the dominant culture. From the time you can think, you are bombarded with images from TV, film, magazines, newspapers.
I usually do about five cuts as a director. I haven't ever directed a film where I haven't made five passes through the movie, and that takes a long time.
By the time I got to the Fox studio for my first major film, I knew how to hit a mark. I knew how to memorize lines. I knew how to pay attention.
You always draw on your experiences with live audiences to know how to do comedy on films. You're working for a laugh that may or may not come six months later, but you're working in a vacuum at the time you are doing it.
As a director, I think it is important to keep a space between yourself and your film. It's like you are in the movie, but at the same time you are watching it from the outside.
I have a film I want to direct. Gena Rowlands was going to do it with me a long time ago. It's about an older woman who's running a ranch in the west the old fashioned way.
I think a film set is a quite controlled environment and you feel like you can trust them and it is going to be a safe place to work, but I really don't think about it.
I think when people go into something for the right reasons, you're going to get a better film; you're going to get more intimacy and a stronger foundation of trust.
When 'The Thin Blue Line' came out, I was criticized by many people for using reenactments, as if I wasn't dedicated to the truth because I filmed these scenes. That always and still seems to be nonsensical.
Alfredo: [after informed about the arrival of the new non-combustible film] Progress always comes late.
[from film trailer] Kristoff: Now we just have to survive this blizzard. Anna: That's no blizzard. That's my sister.
The Governor: [setting a recurring theme of imprisonment throughout the film] Open the door! Open the door! Open the door!... Open the door!
In the industry, you do need some ethics - if one film does well, then thousands get work and money comes back to the industry. I guess the bottomline is, if there are two versions, then the better one will click.
Those of us in the industry who are still foolishly clinging to the idea that female films with women at the center are niche experiences - they are not. Audiences want to see them and, in fact, they earn money. The world is round, people.
It's so hard to raise money for independent films and the fact of the matter is that the bigger my star or whatever is, as a result of doing bigger pictures, the easier it is for me to get money for my own projects.
Acting for me, is a passion, but it's also a job, and I've always approached it as such. I have a certain manual-laborist view of acting. There's no shame in taking a film because you need some money.
If I want to, I can sign 20 films for ridiculous amounts of money, but I really want to do different kinds of cinema. I want creative satisfaction.
We had two cameras, so they could turn it on and shoot as much as we wanted. You don't have to worry about wasting money on film. A lot more takes are possible.
I think there's only one or two films where I've had all the financial support I needed. All the rest, I wish I'd had the money to shoot another ten days.
Whereas money is a means to an end for a filmmaker, to the corporate mind money is the end. Right now, I think independent film is very confused, because there's excess pressure in the marketplace for entertainment to pay off.
I've never done work for money ever. If your choices are based on grosses and the film doesn't do well, what does that mean? It leaves you with nothing.
