Akira Kurosawa Quotes

It is the power of memory that gives rise to the power of imagination.

Man is a genius when he dreams. Dream what you are capable of. The harder you dream it, the sooner it will come true.

The role of the artist is to not look away.

In a mad world only the mad are sane.

If you look at everything straight on, there is nothing to be afraid of.

I can't afford to hate anyone. I don't have that kind of time.

There is nothing that says more about its creator than the work itself.

I am not a special person, I am not especially strong; I am not especially gifted. I simply do not like to show my weakness, and I hate to lose, so I am a person who tries hard. That's all there is to me.

With a good script a good director can produce a masterpiece; with the same script a mediocre director can make a passable film. But with a bad script even a good director can’t possibly make a good film. For truly cinematic expression, the camera and the microphone must be able to cross both fire and water. That is what makes a real movie. The script must be something that has the power to do this.

Human beings are unable to be honest with themselves about themselves. They cannot talk about themselves without embellishing.

The truth is in the mystery.

If you want to be a great director, be a great screenwriter.

In order to find reality, each must search for his own universe, look for the details that contribute to this reality7 that one feels under the surface of things. To be an artist means to search, to find and look at these realities. To be an artist means never to look away.

Man is a genius when he is dreaming.

People today have forgotten they're really just a part of nature. Yet, they destroy the nature on which our lives depend. They always think they can make something better... They don't know it, but they're losing nature. They don't see that they're going to perish. The most important things for human beings are clean air and clean water.

Take me, subtract movies, and you get zero.

To be an artist means to search, to find and look at these realities. To be an artist means to never look away.

The characters in my films try to live honestly and make the most of the lives they've been given. I believe you must live honestly and develop your abilities to the full. People who do this are the real heroes.

For me, filmmaking combines everything. That's the reason I've made cinema my life's work. In films, painting and literature, theatre and music come together. But a film is still a film.

I like unformed characters. This may be because, no matter how old I get, I am still unformed myself.

I suppose all of my films have a common theme. If I think about it, though, the only theme I can think of is really a question: Why can’t people be happier together?

The root of any film project for me is this inner need to express something. What nurtures this root and makes it grow into a tree is the script. What makes the tree bear flowers and fruit is the directing.

Although human beings are incapable of talking about themselves with total honesty, it is much harder to avoid the truth while pretending to be other people. They often reveal much about themselves in a very straightforward way. I am certain that I did. There is nothing that says more about its creator than the work itself.

Something that you should take particular notice of is the fact that the best scripts have very few explanatory passages. Adding explanation to the descriptive passages of a screenplay is the most dangerous trap you can fall into. It’s easy to explain the psychological state of a character at a particular moment, but it’s very difficult to describe it through the delicate nuances of action and dialogue. Yet it is not impossible.

Human beings share the same common problems. A film can only be understood if it depicts these properly.