The inner theme
“Apart from the story any movie has to tell,there is sometimes,although not always,another motif which imparts the Inner Theme- Hope, Faith , Sorrow,The Absurd, The fragility of Happiness- all the great themes of the Human Condition.
When I am ready to convey this inner story and to express its presence,I depend most often upon music for this.”
-Guilo Pontecorvo
Filed under: Filmmakers On Filmmaking | Leave a Comment
Tags: QuoteUnquote
My taste for the mysterious
” Realism is neither an enclosure nor a panorama that has just a single surface. A landscape,for example ,has several textures, and the deepest one,that can be revealed only by poetry,is no less real. It is said ,that what I wish to show, behind the epiderm of things and people ,is the unreal.It is called my taste for the mysterious.For me,the mysterious is man,the long irrational lines of his spiritual life,love,salvation.For me,the key to the mystery-which is to say God-is to be found at the centre of the successive layers of reality….Man is not only a social being,he is also divine.”
Federico Fellini
Filed under: Fellini | 1 Comment
The human face
“Our work in films begins with the human face.The approach to the human face is without doubt the hallmark and the distinguishing quality of the film.We should realize that the best means of expression the actor has at his command is his look.The close-up,if objectively composed,perfectly directed and played, is the most forcible means at the disposal of the film director.”
-Ingmar Bergman
Filed under: Filmmakers On Filmmaking | Leave a Comment
Film is like a personal diary
“Film is like a persona diary,a notebook or a monologue by someone who tries to justify himself before a camera that is almost an accuser ,like one does before a lawyer or a psychiatrist.”
-Goddard
Filed under: Goddard | Leave a Comment
Moral code
” My films have coincided with something that is in the nature of people-the admiration for the individual who has a code and abides by it-who sticks to his own moral code rigorously.I think people like that.They may not know it,but I think that’s what they respond to.”
-John Huston
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
I have rushed through life
” I have understood nothing.Neither about life.Nor myself….Nothing,except perhaps one single thing.That I have rushed through life.That I have glanced neither to right nor left….My attention was always concentrated upon the moment.As if I had been hurrying somewhere.As if I had been anxious not to be late.As if my aim had been to arrive there.As if I had immediately wanted to rush on again further.Fleetingly,as from a train window,I see the images of my childhood,my youthful adventures and the events of my adult life….And suddenly I am struck by the dreadful realization.Everything has slipped through my fingers.I did not know how to grasp hold and cling on.”
-S.M. Eisenstein
Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a Comment
Slow conquest to the Divine
“I am not a pessimist.I believe there is a slow conquest toward the divine state of man.”
-Fellini
Filed under: Fellini | 1 Comment
Stifled by words,images,sounds
“We are stifled by words, images, sounds-none of which has any reason to exist! One must educate oneself to silence…..Guido, my friend- Silence, Emptiness, Nothingness are so beautiful, so pure! If one cannot have everything, then the only real perfection is nothingness.”
From “8 ½ “
Fellini
Filed under: Fellini, Lines from Films | Leave a Comment
Asking questions
“Perhaps, after all, asking questions is more important than finding answers”
From “Le Petit Soldat.” Jean Luc Goddard
Filed under: Goddard, Lines from Films | Leave a Comment
Allow for things to happen
“People always think that I improvise my films-that something, some scene, some moment, some idea, just flies into my head, and I then and there put it in. The fact is, it’s all- intentional. I appear to be improvising only so as not to suffocate the flow of a scene. I call it “attentive passivity”. I allow for things to happen. “
Fellini
Filed under: Fellini, Filmmakers On Filmmaking | Leave a Comment
Strong moments
“I don’t write scripts I just write out the strong moments of the film.”
Goddard
Filed under: Goddard, Scripting | 1 Comment
The mirror in front of us
“The cinema is the art in which man recognizes himself in the most direct way, the mirror in front of which we must have the courage to discover our souls”
Fellini
Filed under: Fellini, Filmmakers On Filmmaking | Leave a Comment
A quest for the essential self
“Every investigation a man makes about himself, about his relations with other people and about the mystery of life is a spiritual investigation and in the true sense of the word-a religious one. I suppose that this is my philosophy. This is neo-realism as far as I am concerned, in its pure and original sense, a quest for the essential self, my own and other’s, along all the paths of life.”
Federico Fellini
Filed under: Fellini, Filmmakers On Filmmaking | Leave a Comment
The rhythm of life
“The truth of our daily lives is neither mechanical, conventional nor artificial, as stories generally are, and if films are made that way, they will show it.
The rhythm of life is not made up of one steady beat, it is instead, a rhythm that is sometimes fast, sometimes slow: it remains motionless for a while, then at the next moment it starts spinning around. The important thing is this: that our acts, our gestures, our words are nothing more than the consequences of our own personal situation in relation to the world around us.”
Michelangelo Antonioni
Filed under: Filmmakers On Filmmaking | Leave a Comment
Most of us are crazy
“ I think you have to be a schizoid three different ways to be an actor. You’ve got to be three different people. You have to be a human being. Then you have to be the character you’re playing. And on top of that you’ve got to be the guy sitting out there in Row 10 watching yourself and judging yourself. That’s why most of us are crazy to start with, or go nuts once we get into it! I mean, don’t you think it’s a pretty spooky way to earn a living?”
George C. Scot
Filed under: Actors On Acting | Leave a Comment
Search
Recent Entries
Categories
- Actors On Acting (1)
- Bunuel (1)
- Fellini (7)
- Filmmakers On Filmmaking (11)
- Goddard (3)
- Introduction (1)
- Lines from Films (2)
- Ozu (1)
- Scripting (1)
- Selection of Subject (1)
- Uncategorized (2)
