Werner Herzog Quotes - Page 4

You better make yourself acquainted to what the requirements are, what the value of money is all about and how you create a long-term survival, and in many cases it has to do with how you handle finances.

If I had to climb into hell and wrestle the devil himself for one of my films, I would do it.

At the same time, there's something magnificent about volcanoes; they created the atmosphere that we need for breathing.

Fragility of modern world leaves me with the idea we'd better anticipate what's going on. We take our right steps today and now. And we'd better avoid, that we are overdependent on, let's say, the internet.

There are deeper strata of truth in cinema, and there is such a thing as poetic, ecstatic truth. It is mysterious and elusive, and can be reached only through fabrication and imagination and stylization.

I have learned a lot through defeats, and, until today, it's - I'm still haunted by defeats, and they do happen. Sometimes, a film of mine is rejected. And how do you deal with it? And you have to learn how to deal with it and survive anyway.

If an actor knows how to milk a cow, I always know it will not be difficult to be in business with him.

Centuries from now our great-great-great-grandchildren will look back at us with amazement at how we could allow such a precious achievement of human culture as the telling of a story to be shattered into smithereens by commercials, the same amazement we feel today when we look at our ancestors for whom slavery, capital punishment, burning of witches, and the inquisition were acceptable everyday events.

Of course, as a German, I wouldn't like to tell the American people how to handle their criminal justice.

This is the birth of the modern human soul. The artists are like us, not like the Neanderthals, who had no culture - and who incidentally were still roaming the landscape at the time the paintings were made. It is striking that there is a distant cultural echo that seems to reach all the way down to us, over dozens of millennia.

I despise formal restaurants. I find all of that formality to be very base and vile. I would much rather eat potato chips on the sidewalk.

"Jack Reacher" was easy because the function of the villain was just to spread fear and horror.

I am someone who takes everything very literally. I simply do not understand irony, a defect I have had ever since I was able to think independently.

If you want to do a film, steal a camera, steal raw stock, sneak into a lab and do it!

You will learn more by walking from Canada to Guatemala than you will ever learn in film school.

I think Irish people started to move to the United States - many things that were of consequence. And it was a tiny and mild event compared to what had happened 74,000 years ago.

You can't have a helicopter fly over boiling lava. It would've exploded from the heat, and is just way too dangerous. The pilot of a helicopter would've flatly refused anyway.

I simply don't like the culture of drugs. I never liked the hippies for it. I think it was a mistake to be all the time stoned and on weed. It didn't look right and it doesn't look right today either and the damage drugs have done to civilizations are too enormous. And besides, I don't need any drug to step out of myself. I don't want them and I do not need them.

I went to volcanoes where I knew that there was a lot of mythology around them; there was something like the creation of gods and monsters and demons.

Clive [Oppenheimer] and I figured out that I'm the only one probably in the film industry who is clinically sane. I say that as a joke, but there's a grain of truth to it. I'm not a stupid daredevil who jumps into the crater of the volcano to get the closest close-up, I'm not one of those. And you have to be aware that you have a crew with you and you are responsible.

You also can understand how to play tennis from Serena Williams, and she is awesome. I haven't seen her Masterclass but just watching her on the court - I saw some of Wimbledon on TV and there's such an awesome force in her and focus and determination and technique, you just look at her and it's awesome. If I would like to learn tennis I would immediately turn to her.

I'm very, very curious about how people live under the volcano, how they handle the permanence of danger.

All of a sudden it's twelve-year-olds who are contacting me, fifteen-year-olds, and they have very, very fascinating questions. However, they speak in a language of their age group which I have to learn first.

I'm a very circumspect and prudent person, and I eliminate danger as far as it can be done.

Perseverance has kept me going over the years. Things rarely happen overnight. Filmmakers should be prepared for many years of hard work. The sheer toil can be healthy and exhilarating.