There is really not that much improvisation in my films. There is an acceptance of a chance.
I've always loved animation and animated films.
We see death constantly on film.
If I'm able to catch the screening, there's a point in the film where, like clockwork, a portion of the audience gets really emotional and begins to cry. And that's very difficult to make happen.
Film is something that came later into my life.
I just decided to make a movie. I had no training, no film school, but I had been to a lot of movies.
I've always felt so grateful that I dropped out of school, that I never had to do a thesis. I wouldn't know how to organise and structure myself to film so that B follows A and C follows B.
We are not documentarians, we are filmmakers.
Filmmakers and artists always thrive during more liberal times.
For a documentary filmmaker, I do very well.
My film about Bush didn't prevent his reelection.
Every fact in my films is true. And yet how often do I have to read over and over again about supposed falsehoods?
I'm used to my films having little effect on making the world a better place.
There's been almost a dozen films that have been made against me. There's actually more films made attacking me than films I've made.
If you do an original film and you want to cut a scene out you do it. But when you do a shot by shot remake you don't have that option and every scene has to work again.
I consider all my films an experiment, at least in my mind.
I'm interested in seeing films that confront me with new things, with films that make me question myself, with films that help me to reflect on subjects that I hadn't thought about before, films that help me progress and advance.
You become a film critic because you're interested in film. I don't know whether knowing so much about cinema leads you to make better films, but it certainly can't hurt.
As a filmmaker I cannot make anything beautiful. I'm Platonic in that sense.
I always approach film as a fan.
I spent 30 years of my life not being wanted at all for films.
You get paid the same for a bad film as you do for a good one.
I am often asked which of my films has come closest to my own ideal of performance, and I always answer, 'Educating Rita.'
In my early days, I didn't know what a good film or a bad film was, and I was trying to make some money. As it happens I was lucky. I made some good films.
I don't refer to myself as a sculptor, but I use the word "visual artist." I prefer that, because that leaves the medium wide open because I've got ideas for film and video, things I haven't had the time yet to really fully explore, probably never will, but I want to be able to have that option open to kind of do that.
