Ang Lee Quotes

When I grew up, in Taiwan, the Korean War was seen as a good war, where America protected Asia. It was sort of an extension of World War II. And it was, of course, the peak of the Cold War. People in Taiwan were generally proAmerican. The Korean War made Japan. And then the Vietnam War made Taiwan. There is some truth to that.

Many times when you make a movie, it feels like your biggest mistake. But even if a film isn't a hit, you shouldn't view it as a mistake.

I don't lead a Hollywood lifestyle.

To me, Ennis stands for the conservative side of America. He's the biggest homophobe in the whole movie - culturally and psychologically - but by the time he admits his feelings, it's too late.

I like to think I'm un-categorisable.

I'm such a late bloomer.

The thing we call critics are not really reviewers, they are not really critics. They don't have the discipline to write what we would term as critique - it's really just reviewers. They have a common man kind of taste. If you watch them overall, they are not different from the box-office. That's my view.

The most mysterious feminine factor, the existence that we men, we don't know. It's woman. It's feminine. That's what the sword is about. That's the symbolic meaning of the sword.

The father figure is something I love, but also suffocate from and want to work against.

If the movie is quiet I generally feel the audience is busy. That's when they're working.

If it was a choice between making movies and doing nothing, he'd probably still wish me to make movies, So he made me keep going.

I'm actually living my life with the material I choose to work with.

In Taiwan, I'd be like Michael Jordan walking down the street.

Usually with this genre the first thing that happens is a good fight sequence to show that you're in good hands. So we broke that rule. I think a lot of that comes from the western audience.

I think for most people, the audience probably couldn't tell the difference, but I know they can be better. And the people working know they can be more precise. I'm still doing another round of sound mixing and color timing, pretty technical stuff. I think the movie's really presentable, nothing was left out that would take you out of the movie. I just need to perfect the job and I still have two weeks to go.

I had to test a new terror in myself.

You have to know the rules, otherwise you have no tools to communicate to the audience, but to keep it fresh you have to break some. I don't choose genres as the element, but the material itself is the element, then I'll decide what genre I need. That's just how I work.

I had to find my way of translating the excitement you get when you're reading comic books to the big screen.

Even dramatically how you position some person, the depth, the existence is different than a flat image even though by itself it has depth, we create the illusion of depth. For example, some of the shots I have to stay closer to the actor because it's a young actor, I like it closer for some of the shots. I watch 2D scenes next to the camera, then when I go back to my station and watch it in 3D I have to go back and reduce his acting, he has to shrink a little bit because he peeks out more.

Depending on the budget. I think I prefer 3D to 2D now. Also, because of 3D I have to use a digital camera, which is the way it's going anyway. That still confuses me, a digital camera versus film.

I think, if allowed, 3D is a new film language. I can have more adventure exploring a new media, that's very exciting. 2D we know most of it, things haven't changed for decades; it's the same principles, so 3D's more exciting.

It's not a pleasure torturing actors, although some of them enjoy it.

I think I prefer 3D to 2D now.

My first instinct was to cast as close to the short story as possible, but then I realized that I needed actors who could go for it and that they had to function well as a couple in a love story.

I took the name Green Destiny from - well there is such a sword called Green Destiny. It is green because you keep twisting it, it's an ancient skill, you keep twisting it and knocking it and twisting it until it is very elastic and light.

The fear factor actually brings the genuineness.

I think the American West really attracts me because it's romantic. The desert, the empty space, the drama.

In the past I've made movies that were pretty universally liked. You can't really hate them. You can discard them, but you can't really hate them.

I'm a big boy now, and I have to deliver.

I think I can work with any type of actor.

I don't have incredible knowledge about films or of filmmaking history; I'm not that kind of person.

Over the years Woodstock got glorified and romanticised and became the event that symbolised Utopia. It's the last page of our collective memory of the age of innocence. Then things turned ugly and would never be the same again.

I did a women's movie, and I'm not a woman. I did a gay movie, and I'm not gay. I learned as I went along.

I see a movie as a way of learning about the world, about myself, and learning about my relationship with people and art.

Making movies is a way of understanding myself and the world.

In my culture, there's a tradition that when you're in an overwhelming situation and you don't know what to do, you put yourself in a woman's shoes.

I guess in Hollywood you chart your life by Oscars. You say to each other, 'Remember when that movie won that year? It was 2006. Remember that?'

The first show to the journalists, that was the first one, so I was very uptight. Then I felt okay about the reception because we did a press conference with good and friendly questions, although people looked serious. So really, after the show you went to - the premiere - that reception tells me I think the movie worked, so that was a relief. I started to feel deflated.

We need storytelling. Otherwise life just goes on and on, like the number Pi.

I'm a storyteller.

So many times you see beautiful lovemaking scenes with a lot of exposure or an awkward lovemaking scene, but I think it's very rare that you see it private.

My father's family were liquidated during the Cultural Revolution in China because they were landowners. He was the only one to escape. I was born and brought up in Taiwan. But you absorb the trauma. My parents had no sense of security.

There's a certain time in the core of making a movie from pre-production to halfway through post-production I don't read any project, my agent will tell people that "he's not reading." And then when I know how the movie's probably gonna work halfway into post-production, I'll come along.

Making a martial arts film in English to me is the same as John Wayne speaking Chinese in a western

Every movie is unknown.

Meanwhile, the Ice Storm was still in development, And that was something I really wanted to do, and frankly I don't think I was ready to do a big production like this.

I find it hard to deliver straightforward things.

Sometimes, you have to get angry to get things done.

I hope people don't compare 2D and 3D because 3D's new, it's unfair to compare to 2D which is really sophisticated, even when we're jaded about it. 3D just began, give it a chance, let the equipment and projection system catch up and be better, let the price go down, let more filmmakers get a hold of it more easily.

The way I go about a lovemaking scene is that we will talk about it during the rehearsing time.

I try to please everyone.

Fighting for identity is something that is very much in my life.

So there was one point I thought I was gonna lose it, but once I get on something I have to finish it; I just kept persuading them and they turned around. One good thing was the international guys really stood behind this movie, they thought they could support this film. So these guys step up and that's really good, and then they turned around.

Summer blockbusters are very expensive to make. They have things that have to be expensive, such as 600 effects shots or CG characters that have to go a certain way, or a film design that is different but expensive.

I think doing period piece is easier, because after a certain distance, everybody is equal, I think. The relative contemporary is harder. I think that's the way it is.

First we pre-visualized it so the actors could act. It took a long time to get that to come to life and to design those coming out of the screen. We had great fun with that. It takes a long time, a year maybe.

Directing, I get all kinds of inspiration. It's working with people. It's a lot more fun.

3D is quite a lot more advanced in animated movies; for live-action movies we're just taking baby steps, we're just in the beginning.

Beautifully-acted and precisely observed, ILO ILO is an amazing debut, full of heart and intelligence.

When there is a strong woman character in a story - that always grabs me.

I think a movie is a media that is evoking feelings.

I just did a dramatic love story. Whether it's a cultural phenomenon is not for me to say.

I'm a drifter and an outsider. There's not one single environment I can totally belong to.

When I sent those scripts, that was the lowest point of my life. We'd just had our second son, and when I went to collect them from hospital, I went to the bank to try and get some money to buy some diapers, the screen showed I've got $26 left.

When I started out, nobody gave me scripts, so I had to write.

With 3D you're right there immersed in the world.

I'm still a novice student.

When something possesses me, I go ahead and do it.

San Francisco is one of my favourite cities in the world ... I would probably rank it at the top or near the top. It's small but photogenic and has layers ... You never have problems finding great angles that people have never done.

I don't like to deal with studios.

The woman's perspective is like the dark side of the moon: it always exists, but it is never exposed, at least not in my culture.

When I see something I like, that's all that counts. What they use, how they get there, I never bother them.

I don't know if I make the best gay films.

I hate to think life is just facts and laws.

I don't think the Hulk is a superhero. He's the first Marvel character who is a tragic monster. Really an anti-hero.

For six years, from 1985 to 1991, I felt pretty weak and useless.

My father was the center of the family, and everyone tried to please him.

My hometown was one of the major U.S. Air Force bases.

I'm a shy human being.

I'm just a pretty regular dad.

When you talk about God, the first thing that comes along is not love, it's fear. You have to fear, and be in awe. You have to be scared. Any religion, it's like first thing ...

Sometimes films ignore other points of view because it's simpler to tell the story that way, but the more genuine and sympathetic you are to different points of view and situations, the more real the story is.

I think it[3D] should be used as a new artistic form, not as a gimmick, not to impress you but the existence of an environment that you view as a theatrical dramatic experience is - you don't just have the X-Y axis, you have the Z and that makes a difference. You still have the framing, you still use lenses, so most of the cinematic rules and languages still apply but I think it's a different existence.

As artists, we like night more than day sometimes.

Americans are hidden dragons to me.

I feel like all of my characters now take this congested situation, they clash, and from there you purge yourself.

A movie is really provocation. It's not a message, it's not a statement.

These days I'm mostly familiar with two parts of L.A.: one is movie culture, and the other is Asian culture. The Westside is work, and the Eastside is Chinese - which means my friends.

I like to do drama, something about life that could be disappointing.

When I'm not working, I get very down, but when I am working, I get very immersed in it.

For a filmmaker, it's a rare chance to do a personal film on a big canvas.

I think great romance needs great obstacles and textures.

I am not particularly religious. But I think we do face the question of where God is, why we are created and where does life go, why we exist. That sort of thing. And it is very hard to talk about it these days, because it cannot be proven. It is hard to discuss it rationally.

Making this movie as a period piece about a period that was very recent in people's minds. I was in Taiwan [during the 1970s], so I hope I did all right. Otherwise, it could be the biggest embarrassment of my life. Also, the story is not linear, it's patchy, like a cubist painting, and there is always the possibility it will not hold together, it will fall apart. The tone is part satire, part serious drama, part tragedy, all mixed together, and it has to hit an emotional core. That's also very scary.

I'm not a romantic. In life I didn't have much experience with romance.

I grew up pretty much prevented from knowing anything from Communist China except that they were the bad guys that stole our country.

I'm aware of what's missing from my life.

The L.A. weather is a lot like Taiwan's, where you don't observe four seasons, so the years can pass and you don't feel a thing.

It's just what I am. When I am in the zone making one movie, I just didn't want to read anything else or do anything else, so I don't really develop projects.

I'm not macho, I'm not a Mel Gibson sort of person.