George Hickenlooper Quotes

I always say be humble but be firm. Humility and openness are the key to success without compromising your beliefs.

Theres something unique about the United States, a sense of individual rights and freedoms, and a sense of social and civic responsibility that we contributed to so much of the world. We lost that mission in the 1980s and 1990s, when we entered a gilded age, and the culture of individualism became a culture of avarice.

Im very strongly in favor of the auteur theory.

The promise of celebrity is a transcendental human state of existence. It's not real. We do know the fact that celebrities as mortal beings exist and if you are looking for love by being famous or being around the famous - ultimately that goes away.

Im fascinated by failure, and Im fascinated by finality. Shakespeares historical plays are more universal than his comedies because they relate to the finality of life. Without finality, life would not be beautiful.

I love the grandiosity of Hollywood movies, and even in independents, I love the canvas you can tell your story on. I love fiction filmmaking, you really feel like you're creating something.

I think that narrative, fiction filmmaking is the culmination of several art forms: theater, art history, architecture. Whereas doc filmmaking is more pure cinema, like cinema verite is film in its purest form.

The arc of the celebrity phenomenon ultimately is: everything turns to dust and everything does go away.

Most people, 95% of people, are good people. Its the 5% who get seduced by power.

Generally in my films like Hearts of Darkness or Picture This, I try not to make myself a presence in the film.

Obviously you have a responsibility - one would like to think there is such a thing as ethics in filmmaking.

Narrative, fiction filmmaking is the culmination of several art forms: theater, art history, architecture. Whereas doc filmmaking is more pure cinema, like cinema verité is film in its purest form. You're taking random images and creating meaning out of random images, telling a story, getting meaning, capturing something that's real, that's really happening, and render this celluloid sculpture of this real thing. That's what really separates the power of doc filmmaking from fiction.

At times doc filmmaking feels more rewarding creatively. Because you are creating something out of pure cinema - instead of narrative cinema, where you've got a script and a cast and you build from your foundation, whereas in documentary, you're building out of chaos.

Docs are more exhausting because of the physical labor that's required. Feature filmmaking is more exhausting because of politics and the bullshit. You get to the point of rolling film and until you lock picture it's one political game after another. They're both struggles for survival. They are two different worlds.