Quotes About Film Directing

#1. I teach film directing, inasmuch as you can. It's not really possible to teach film direction, but I sit there as a sort of testimony of experience and know-how, I suppose.

Stephen Frears

#2. Film directing has perfected my theater directing. I think when I first started directing, a lot of my stuff was very lateral; I was afraid to have the actors' backs turned away, afraid to put them too far upstage, and I think once I did more things with film, I got more interested in composition.

Adam Rapp

#3. I directed three films and each time [I act] I hope it's the last time so I have time to do my film [directing].

Mathieu Amalric

#4. I was a film-directing major at NYU. I'm still not sure why I became a directing major, when I was really an actor and a comedian, but there was something that drew me to doing that.

Billy Crystal

#5. The dynamics of film directing and fashion design - in the ways that I've done it - were not dissimilar.

Tom Ford

#6. Drumming is like film directing. You build a framework for everyone to create something together.

James Genn

#7. I'm a Mac user. I think it depends on how you were brought up, and I was introduced to Apple quite early. They're certainly the best for visual stuff and film-directing.

Andy Serkis

#8. I watch 'Goodfellas,' and suddenly it frees me up entirely; it reminds me of what great film directing is all about.

Peter Jackson

#9. Once I went to film school, I realized that film directing was actually much better than theater directing, because you kind of get to stay in control of it all the way through. You don't relinquish the piece to the actors like you have to in theater; you stay in control through the very end.

Mark Waters

#10. I don't know anything about directing, but if you love actors, know your story and hire a great company, then anyone can direct a film.

Peter Hedges

#11. Directing is more what I would like to get into eventually. Frankly, I feel like it would be a waste if I didn't because I've spent so much time on film sets, and I know how they work, and I love them, and I love leading them. I would like to do that as a director definitely.

Daniel Radcliffe

#12. In my mid-20s, I was directing episodes of 'Alfred Hitchcock' and 'Peter Gunn.' I was pretty much on course and - as I sometimes joke - was prepared to devote my life to become the second best film director in my family.

George Stevens Jr.

#13. If the film isn't in some way going to study behavior then I'm not interested, but the reason why I'm not interested in directing in film is that it would take me, to be as good an artist as I feel I am an actor, it would take me another 35 just to conquer ...

Bruce Dern

#14. The difference between directing film and directing television is so stark simply because TV is a living breathing organism already when you direct an episode.

Jon Hamm

#15. Making films is much more difficult than people imagine, and so the experience of actually directing them is not one I've ever relished.

Sydney Pollack

#16. Try to produce your own films, avoid directing for hire.

Atom Egoyan

#17. I just don't want to make the same old movies. I'm not interested in it. Directing's hard. It takes up a lot of your life, and I'm not that interested in making the same old film.

Drew Goddard

#18. When I think about directing a film, the thing that stops me short is wondering if I'm a natural at it the way I think you, and PTA, and Fincher are born directors. Maybe some people's talent is in understanding the ways that film communicates, without dialogue, without plot.

Edward Norton

#19. Directing a film was something I was yearning to do. I always wanted to see if I had the capacity to be a good storyteller.

Kevin Spacey

#20. No form of art goes beyond ordinary consciousness as film does, straight to our emotions, deep into the twilight room of the soul.

Ingmar Bergman

#21. They offered me that film before I did Frida and I said, no, I'm not capable of directing. Then after seeing Julie direct, I was inspired by it. She motivated me to do it, because we don't have role models as woman for directors.

Salma Hayek

#22. I had the experience last year of directing my first feature while I had a 1-year-old son and while I was also pregnant, so I am now well aware of the difficulties women who are rearing children face when they're also trying to make headway in mainstream of film.

Diablo Cody

#23. I'm very manipulative towards directors. My theory is that everyone on the set is directing the film, we're all receiving art messages from the universe on how we should do the film.

Jeff Bridges

#24. Directing your first film is like showing up to the field trip in seventh grade, getting on the bus, and making an announcement, 'So today I'm driving the bus.' And everybody's like, 'What?' And you're like, 'I'm gonna drive the bus.' And they're like, 'But you don't know how to drive the bus.'

Mike Birbiglia

#25. It was really interesting to be editing the film [Trust] in New York and directing the play in Chicago, and one definitely informed the other. The play probably benefitted more because I realized what scenes could be cut, and I cut those scenes from the play.

David Schwimmer

#26. I am incapable of directing a film like 'Agneenath.' I can do only what I am good at, so I would have been the worst choice to direct it. It has aggression, action and an inherent violence in it - things I am not capable of directing in my films.

Karan Johar

#27. I did a film many years ago called The Man Without A Face.Gaby [Hoffmann] was in with Mel Gibson. That was his directing debut. He did a great job.

Richard Masur

#28. I attend film school, my background is acting and directing. But the acting does best, I like to work on the stage.

Tommy Wiseau

#29. That's what's nice about directing a film and having it done: There's nothing more I can do about it. It's done. That's it. All I can do is let it go and hope that people are kind to it.

Tom Hanks

#30. When you're writing, it's all up to you, and you don't have to make any compromises. And when you're directing, there's this intense pleasure you get from working with all these really talented people, and pooling the efforts towards a common goal. I like all the aspects of film-making.

Henry Selick

#31. I think that directing is the ultimate martyred task of filmmaking, that it has nobility to it. It takes three years to make a film, for the most part. I think it requires the attentiveness of a mother hen.

Diane Lane

#32. So if I keep making mistakes on Broadway or tape or film, producing, directing or acting, I can go along and do it - so long as I'm not investing too much capital in these things.

Jackie Cooper

#33. I have no interest whatsoever in pursuing acting or becoming a mogul. I love writing and directing; I see those two jobs as the most critical in the making of a film.

James Gray

#34. I hope to be acting until I'm playing the role of Grandma, and I'd like to branch out in film - producing, directing, all of it. I'll sleep when no one wants to hire me!

America Ferrera

#35. I have been directing and involved in producing and the creating of films for quite a while as well as acting. I always think in terms of what the director needs, and not just for this scene but for the film.

George Clooney

#36. When I started out, there were three things that made film people look at me with condescension, I was young, I was black, and I was female. I have won a certain respect, but I think the film community still sees directing as a male job.

Euzhan Palcy

#37. I don't know if people realize how hard I work, because sometimes people ask me for my secret. The truth is that I don't have any secrets apart from the fact that I've been directing theater and film for twenty years and trying at every stage to make my work better.

Lucy Walker

#38. Part of the process of acting in a film that you're also directing is really trusting the people around you to capture your vision, which hopefully you have communicated well to them.

Katie Aselton

#39. I'm pretty focused on what I do. I think directing is a very specific talent, and I'm not real big on putting puzzles together, which is basically what a film is.

Samuel L. Jackson

#40. I guess because I'm so young, I m not sure of what lies ahead for me. I'm more into going the route of producing and directing. I just made a little short film. I'm more excited about going the route of doing a Drew Barrymore or ... what's the one from 'Star Wars?'

Heather Morris

#41. Directing is much more psychological-it's a lot like being a general. And you have to be organized. While you're making a film, you have between two and 500 people asking you a billion questions.

Julie Taymor

#42. I took all my TV experience and what I learned about - by writing and directing and bringing a movie to Sundance - about the realities of the independent film market: 'Transparent' is the marriage of those two situations.

Jill Soloway

#43. I was on 'The O.C.' and had a small part, which wasn't very challenging. I was a bit bored, so I started shadowing directors and they finally gave me a shot. From there, it led to directing other television shows. I am trying to direct a feature film, so we'll see what happens.

Tate Donovan

#44. I love directing Shakespeare on film. It's fantastic that the actors would do exactly the same thing and be true to their part.

Julie Taymor

#45. 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.

Akira Kurosawa

#46. I spent several years in the film finance business, but I returned to what I loved most about the industry - actual filmmaking, producing, writing and directing.

Gabriel Campisi

#47. I keep joking that I'm in Jason Reitman Film School, because I keep asking him questions every single day about directing and I have a list of things that he's told me to do and not do and I definitely couldn't learn from a better person.

Diablo Cody

#48. I have always believed that directing a film is like telling a story. You have to tell it well so that it is appreciated.

Anupam Kher

#49. People think that the directors direct actors. No. Really, what the director's doing is directing the audience's eye through the film.

Julianne Moore

#50. The idea of directing a film is a strange one for me. I feel anti-mathematical, in a way, in that sense. I don't like when things make sense. I prefer if they don't.

Johnny Depp

#51. The prospect of being able to work on a Kaufman film with him directing was just too good to be true.

Elijah Wood

#52. I don't think there is any one route to directing ... Other than that I think you just have to think 'By any means possible' and take any job you can that will get you experience. I also did a lot for free. I got paid virtually nothing for my first film, but it changed my life.

Mary Harron

#53. If I dream that I'm directing, it's not a film, it's like a commercial for cotton candy, and I've got four feet of cotton candy all around me that I've got to break through, like a brick wall or a fortress.

Mike Birbiglia

#54. I'm not retired, I will continue directing films and doing fight choreography. I won't stop.

Yuen Woo-ping

#55. I thought Jack's directing job was the best thing about the film.

Harvey Keitel

#56. I love directing because you get to see your film come to life. You get to work with the actors. There's something magical about each piece of it.

Dee Rees

#57. Directing film is the hardest thing I have ever done.

Anton Corbijn

#58. Although I feel directing is a lot more challenging, fulfilling and satisfying, it is also far more stressful & consuming. This is why I don't see myself directing one film after another in quick succession.

Nandita Das

#59. My background are acting, film production, directing, and I studied them for many years. Keep in mind that you need many other skills when you are starting any film project related to real life.

Tommy Wiseau

#60. Directing a film is a lot of work.

Fred Durst

#61. It's like being the general of an army [directing a film]. You send people out to die.

Jennifer Yuh Nelson

#62. I know it's good when I see a smaller film get recognized because it means more publicity for them. When you start producing and directing the movies become a little more like your children.

Campbell Scott

#63. The notion of directing a film is the invention of critics - the whole eloquence of cinema is achieved in the editing room.

Orson Welles

#64. When I made my first film, I didn't think of it as directing, so it wasn't like I set out to become a director.

Kathryn Bigelow

#65. Fundamentally, whether directing in the theatre or a film, you have to be a good storyteller, regardless of the form. The thing I had to work hardest at was thinking in shots.

John Crowley

#66. My M.F.A was in directing, and all the films I've made, for film school and after, I've written, directed and shot.

Geoffrey S. Fletcher

#67. One of the common themes you will read in interview after interview is the call to keep fighting for your vision. This is a message to women directors, producers, writers - anyone who wants to work in the business. Your voice counts. Your vision matters.

Melissa Silverstein

#68. Sometimes it's difficult directing yourself on film because you can't quite separate yourself from the subject.

Stanley Tucci

#69. 'Room' is a very subtly-made film, and directing awards tend to go to the flashier stuff, but it's the Director's section of the academy that make the decision, so I'm very proud they can see something in what I directed and wanted to reward it.

Lenny Abrahamson

#70. I did a film that I shot in 24 hours that was self-financed for $5,000. It was a feature called Looking For Jimmy that I shot with a bunch of friends. I spent eight months editing because we had 24 hours of footage that made no sense and I learned a lot about directing while editing that film.

Julie Delpy

#71. Whether it's acting, directing or writing, I want to be involved in the film industry for the rest of my life.

Tom Felton

#72. My dream is to do exactly what I'm doing. I love writing and directing, and being somebody that can write about an artist I love or make a film about it. That's great. I would leave the other stuff to those who do it much better.

Cameron Crowe

#73. The film [Close Up] made itself, to a large extent. The characters involved were very real, I wasn't directing the actors so much as being directed by them. So it was a very particular film.

Abbas Kiarostami

#74. I have a great team. A lot of my focus every day is with my television and film career, directing and producing, and I guess you can say that my moonlighting gig is Tropfest. Obviously, when I am not working I am in the Tropfest office full-time.

John Polson

#75. I'm not a preacher and I'm not a pastor. But I really feel my career was leading me to make this. The Holy Ghost was working through me on this film, and I was just directing traffic. I hope the film has the power to evangelize.

Mel Gibson

#76. In film, I don't think I'd try directing. Maybe one day, but I'd certainly want to go to film school or something before I tried to do something like that. That would be quite scary.

Amelia Warner

#77. I think it's a very strange question that I have to defend myself. I don't feel that. You are all my guests, it's not the other way around, that's how I feel.

Lars Von Trier

#78. I'll be in # Jharkhand along with Kaustav Narayan Niyogi, who is directing the film and my director of photography for location hunting. I want to lock the locations before Christmas as everyone goes into vacation mode after that,

Pooja Bhatt

#79. I was joking with my mom that all Jewish mothers now will want their kids to be filmmakers instead of doctors. Because you can make one film, and suddenly you're directing a 'Jurassic Park' movie.

Colin Trevorrow

#80. I guess what I enjoy most is directing, because it incorporates all aspects of filmmaking. Directing is in the same line as acting - both are popularity contests, and in both you're trying to tell a story through the film as a medium.

James Franco

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

Akira Kurosawa

#82. Stunt coordinating is a good training ground for directing because you have exposure to all the departments in film.

David Leitch

#83. British people might wonder 'What the hell is Kenneth Branagh doing directing 'Thor?' but the person asking that the most was Kenneth Branagh. I think he was more surprised than anyone else to find himself doing this kind of film.

Tadanobu Asano

#84. I was ambitious and desperate to direct my first film, so I capitulated and blew it. Never again. Never fucking again.

Craig Ferguson

#85. From an outsider's perspective, it's amazing what [Clint Eastwood] does. If he's not directing a film, he's acting in it, or rather he's composing the music for that film. His commitment to what he does is astounding for all of us to witness. It's inspiring, actually.

Leonardo DiCaprio

#86. I don't necessarily recommend directing your husband or wife in a film, but if you have to do it, you have to do it.

Scott Foley

#87. I like every part [of the film process ] except the business and admin stuff. The initial idea. Writing. Re-writing. Casting. Directing, Editing. If I had to chose I'd say writing, followed by putting music on the picture. That is magical.

Ricky Gervais

#88. Writing and directing your own film, for me, has been the best experience of my life.

Nicholas Jarecki

#89. I'm just ah, actually developing a tv show for HBO, and I'm directing a film this summer, and actually I'm doing some live shows out in western Canada.

Bruce McCulloch

#90. I enjoyed Jonathan Franzen's 'Freedom.' Would I make that into a film? I think it's better suited to television. That would very much be a dialogue and performance piece, and it would take some very skilful direction - but not my kind of directing. But I thought it was a real literary work.

Peter Weir

#91. Directing a film was something I always wanted to do, something that seemed an inevitability in my development as an actor.

Martin Donovan

#92. Suddenly I was writing a lot of screenplays, and I was no long in New York, so I stopped acting in plays, and it just became too tricky to find a part to play, either in a play or a film that coincided with my schedule writing and or directing.

Michael Cristofer

#93. I would consider directing. I think directing myself would be tough, but I'm definitely interested in directing. I might start off directing a play before I move to a film.

John C. Reilly

#94. Once you're directing, you're kind of in a certain mode, where you're taking whatever is on the page and forming it into the film that you think it might want to be. So whether it's my writing or not, I still try to work with it in the same way.

Gus Van Sant

#95. There's no real rules about what you do [while directing]; it's just you just use your instincts as to the pacing of a film and what is repetitive and what is the minimum amount you can get away with to tell the story, that scene didn't make it in.

Peter Jackson

#96. As far as writing or directing a film, I've worked with enough people who have done that that I know it's just a whole other level of responsibility and chaos and murder that I could not see happening. For now, I'm just going to see what comes. I know what I like and what direction I have.

Zak Orth

#97. I've learned so much from just being in film industry. I definitely want to stay in front of the camera and learn more from as many people as I can. Somewhere down the line, writing, directing and producing would be fantastic.

Nico Tortorella

#98. Directing is creating a whole. You're able to combine different elements and create a film that is unique and true to your vision.

Tim Robbins

#99. I do love directing. I'm only comfortable working in the independent film arena for a very small budget where I have creative control and I can put my stamp on it.

Vera Farmiga