Frederick Wiseman Quotes

You have to edit the material. That assumes that some kind of a mind is operating in relation to the material. Not all minds are the same. Every aspect of filmmaking requires choice. The selection of the subject, the shooting, editing and length are all aspects of choice.

I'm interested in ordinary experience, and regardless of the precise definition of ordinary, and I've found that in so-called ordinary experience, there is as much comedy, tragedy, sadness, as there is in great drama. And I don't invent it, I recognize it.

Of course there's conscious manipulation! Everything about a movie is manipulation ... If you like it, it's an interpretation. If you don't like it, it's a lie - but everything about these movies is a distortion."

Documentary filmmaking ruins you for real life, because you learn to be extremely attentive.

Anybody whose mind is functioning at all can't be content with the way the world works.

Everything about a movie is manipulation.

Making movies is an effort is an attempt to leave a trace of your existence.

I think I have an obligation, to the people who have consented to be in the film, to make a film that is fair to their experience. The editing of my films is a long and selective process. I do feel that when I cut a sequence, I have an obligation to the people who are in it, to cut it so that it fairly represents what I felt was going on at the time, in the original event. I don't try and cut it to meet the standards of a producer or a network or a television show.

I do not think that my films or films by any other filmmaker represent "THE TRUTH." I do not feel the need to categorize my films or anyone else's.

My job as a film editor is to construct a dramatic narrative because otherwise it's just a chaotic arrangement of sequences.

It is always a problem to know what an image means.

In moviemaking, you learn to pay attention to detail, because so much is in the detail. And when you're shooting, you try to be very alert to what's going on, even if you're tired.

I think my movies aren't sentimental. I think my movies are funny and sad and realistic. Not realistic in the sense that they're documentaries, but realistic in the sense that they're not idealistic, they're not optimistic, not pessimistic, and not propagandistic. They're an analysis of a situation. I call it as I see it, so to speak.

I don't really know what I want, other than good sequences, whatever that means. What I find is always a matter of chance, judgment, and luck.

I don't like to read novels where the novelist tells me what to think about the situation and the characters. I prefer to discover for myself.

My goal is to make as many films as possible about different aspects of American life.

This whole business of documentary being a second-class citizen is bullshit. A documentary can be as interesting, as dramatic, as sad, as funny, blah, blah, blah, as a fiction movie. Or it can be as awful as a fiction movie!

There's the internal rhythm within a sequence, and then there's the rhythm between the sequences, and that's extremely important in constructing the narrative. For example, you don't put two big dramatic scenes right next to each other. But you can use the rhythm of the transition shots; they can often serve a double purpose.

I'm drawn to making movies about contemporary life. The reason I choose institutions is because they provide a limit, a boundary.

I think I've learned a lot about how to make movies, and particularly about how to edit movies by thinking about how similar problems are resolved in other forms. The issues in all forms are the same in an abstract sense, aren't they? Characterization, abstraction, metaphor, passage of time... Whether it's a movie, a novel, a play, or a poem, those issues exist. And each person resolves them differently.

If I worked in my apartment, I'd never leave my apartment.

There's a literal track: who says what to whom, what are people wearing, etcetera. And there's the abstract track: what ideas are suggested by the literal. And the real movie takes place in the relationship between the literal and the abstract.

I'm very careful of not being critical of other people's movies, which work in different styles. I think some of my movies can be interpreted as critical of their subjects.

I'm in no way suggesting that I succeed, but it's inspiring to read somebody who does succeed and from whom, in a general way, you can draw examples and nourishment and sustenance.

Whether you're a newspaper journalist, a lawyer, a doctor. You have to organize your thoughts.