Film Criticism Quotes

I can no longer think what I want to think. My thoughts have been replaced by moving images. ~ Georges Duhamel

This is not the "relativism of truth" presented by journalistic takes on postmodernism. Rather, the ironist's cage is a state of irony by way of powerlessness and inactivity: In a world where terrorism makes cultural relativism harder and harder to defend against its critics, marauding international corporations follow fair-trade practices, increasing right-wing demagoguery and violence can't be answered in kind, and the first black U.S. president turns out to lean right of center, the intelligentsia can see no clear path of action. Irony dominates as a "mockery of the promise and fitness of things," to return to the OED definition of irony.

This thinking is appropriate to Wes Anderson, whose central characters are so deeply locked in ironist cages that his films become two-hour documents of them rattling their ironist bars. Without the irony dilemma Roth describes, we would find it hard to explain figures like Max Fischer, Steve Zissou, Royal Tenenbaum, Mr. Fox, and Peter Whitman. I'm not speaking here of specific political beliefs. The characters in question aren't liberals; they may in fact, along with Anderson himself, have no particular political or philosophical interests. But they are certainly involved in a frustrated and digressive kind of irony that suggests a certain political situation. Though intensely self-absorbed and central to their films, Anderson's protagonists are neither heroes nor antiheroes. These characters are not lovable eccentrics. They a ~ Arved Mark Ashby

What the internet has done is destroy film criticism. I would never have guessed that the profession of film criticism would be going the way of the dodo bird. ~ Quentin Tarantino

Of course the French are making very credible movies and it is still one of the greatest nations in terms of world cinema but the real problem is the decay in film criticism. ~ Wim Wenders

I read every single review, because I love film criticism and I'm interested. ~ Melanie Lynskey

In this age of consumerism film criticism all over the world - in America first but also in Europe - has become something that caters for the movie industry instead of being a counterbalance. ~ Wim Wenders

An often-repeated assertion in the body of film criticism I have written is the assertion that movies do not just mirror the culture of any given time; they also create it. ~ Bell Hooks

My favorite laser disk ever was the laser disk for The Graduate, which had a commentary track that wasn't even the filmmakers, it was a professor, some film criticism guy who just happen to be this amazing commentator who went off into the whole theory of comedy. ~ Jay Roach

To describe this film as dishonest and demagogic would almost be to promote those terms to the level of respectability. To describe this film as a piece of crap would be to run the risk of a discourse that would never again rise above the excremental. To describe it as an exercise in facile crowd-pleasing would be too obvious. Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of 'dissenting' bravery. ~ Christopher Hitchens

I'll tell you, I think that the Internet has provided an enormous boost to film criticism by giving people an opportunity to self publish or to find sites that are friendly. ~ Roger Ebert

I don't have a very high opinion, actually, of the world of criticism - or the practice of criticism. I think I admire art criticism, criticism of painting and sculpture, far more than I do that of say films and books, literary or film criticism. But I don't much like the practice. I think there are an awful lot of bad people in it. ~ Tom Robbins

Farber had a huge effect on me as a writer. I don't mean I write like him. Farber is, first of all, a great stylist, a great writer. Anyone can read Manny Farber's film criticism, whether that person is a novelist, a poet, another critic, a historian, and learn a lot about writing by reading him. ~ Greil Marcus

To go into more specifics regarding actors, whether they're from Korea or the U.S., all actors know if they are loved by the director. When they feel that love from the director, they respond by giving a great performance on camera. Also, everyone on set - the crew, the actors - they were aware of the film's message and its broad theme, so these big issues were never discussed on set. ~ Kim Jee-woon

Now listen carefully: Marriage, to me, is not a chain but an association. I must be free, entirely unfettered, in all my actions
my coming and my going; I can tolerate neither control, jealousy, nor criticism as to my conduct. I pledge my word, however, never to compromise the name of the man I marry, nor to render him ridiculous in the eyes of the world. But that man must promise to look upon me as an equal, an ally, and not as an inferior, or as an obedient, submissive wife. My ideas, I know, are not like those of other people, but I shall never change them. ~ Guy De Maupassant

You want to kill me??
- So I guess that truth hurts, but why it hurts?
Lie doesn't but truth does??
How does it happen??
So you go... you say "Well, well pretty nice made knife..." and you are looking it by moving it like rotate and such type of stuff and one moment you want to kill me. But why??
Is it because I just "I lived" or it was because of "Listen" or it was because of "The Walk"??

or what's the answer? ~ Deyth Banger

The setting, concerns, and mood of The Woodlanders are consonant with the Wessex of the earlier novels. There is an element of nostalgia in Hardy's treatment of the woodlands of Little Hintock. Although such rural economies were very much alive in Hardy's day, he strikes an elegiac note in his evocation of a world that will inevitably pass away. However, the woodlands do not form the backdrop to an idyllic pastoral of humanity living in tranquil harmony with nature. The trees, which are such a dominant presence in the novel, compete with each other for nourishment and light, are vulnerable to disease and damage, and are frightening in their moaning under the lash of the storm. The woodlands represent the Darwinian struggle for existence that Hardy sees as extending not only to the inhabitants of this little world but also beyond ... ~ Geoffrey Harvey

After my film 'The Tale of Two Sisters,' I received a lot of offers from Hollywood to direct, but because 'A Tale of Two Sisters' was a horror film, I received a lot of horror films. But I wasn't interested in working in the same genre, and the scripts I received for films in different genres were for projects that were near completion. ~ Kim Jee-woon

I don't think I could ever have a desk job, so I get to be mobile. I'm on set. I get to walk around kind of doing my own thing, being independent - it's just a really good vibe. Everyone on a film set is very happy, and they all love their jobs, so it's a cool environment to be a part of. ~ Jean-Luc Bilodeau

My father ran London Films. He made films like 'The Red Shoes,' 'The Third Man.' And he had had a long career in the film business, which was bifurcated with a career in intelligence. He had to deal with gangsters, and sometimes he would take me with him. Also, I went to school with their children. ~ Mark Helprin

But strangely, [in] the original Matt Helm books, he's just this super hardass assassin. They sort of made it into a sexy romp for the movies. The books are very, very dark. I also watched OSS 117: Cairo, Nest Of Spies, which is a French film. They just made a second one, I think, which is based on like, 100 novels. They're just fantastic. They're set in the '60s. A lot of the visual inspiration definitely came from 1960 James Bond movies and OSS 177 and also Pink Panther movies. ~ Adam Reed

I'm like the king of the low-budget sequel. People ask, 'What film are you gonna do next?' 'I don't know, but it's probably got a 3 or 4 in the title.' ~ Scott Adkins

You can't tell what's in a person's heart until you truly Know them. ~ Belle

Voices of Transition educates, opens minds to new possibilities and presents a new vision of how our food system could be. As a historic transition unfolds, this film is a very powerful tool. ~ Rob Hopkins

His chief failing was a habit of cracking heavy pedantic jokes; he was unable to let a good idea drop, and remarked several times during the course of the film that the heroine looked like she ought to be playing the horse. The comment had some truth in it, in that the heroine did have an equine cast of feature, but he made it too often, and with too little variation; however, she was willing to forgive him, in view of his evident tolerance of her social errors, such as an inability to say whether or not she wanted an ice cream. ~ Margaret Drabble

Many of the shows I danced in don't exist on film, but they do exist in the memories of those who were in the theater for that single moment in time. And nothing can replace that. ~ Chita Rivera

If we are to have such a discipline we must have standards, and to get our standards under existing conditions we must have criticism. ~ Irving Babbitt

Don't think of my indifference to criticisms as weakness. I keep silent most of the times, because my response is too human to be wasted on wild animals. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Opinions of the masses kill the 'extra' in an 'extraordinary' idea. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

To suggest, as Shine does, that my father was in some way mean-spirited is totally unfair. Holding back David's career was not in the least my father's aim. He was extremely proud of his son and nurtured his talent in every way. He was David's strongest advocate. But allowing any boy who had just turned fourteen to live by himself so far away without proper provisions being made for him would have been irresponsible, to say the least.
In David's case, it would have been particularly inappropriate. He had never been abroad before; he was completely hopeless in practical matters; and he needed to be looked after, cooked for, and cared for. He was also by that time behaving rather erratically, although of course we did not know then that these may have been the first signs of a serious mental illness. My father's attitude was proved correct: when David did go to London of his own volition four years later, he fell ill and ended up receiving psychiatric care.
In any case there simply wasn't enough money available to finance the trip to America. Contrary to what is related in Shine, where my father and Mr. Rosen decide that David should have a bar mitzvah as a method of raising money for this trip, David had already had his bar mitzvah almost a year earlier, when he turned thirteen, the usual age for this ceremony. His bar mitzvah had nothing to do with "digging for gold," as Mr. Rosen puts it in Shine, in one of several offensive references in the film to Jews or Ju ~ Margaret Helfgott

I didn't want to go down the route of spending a year of my life making a movie that would never be seen. I may as well go down a route making a film that a lot of people will see, which is the whole idea behind cinema. ~ Ridley Scott

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

The brutality that can take place in a crime film heightens the tenderness that can also be there. ~ Geoffrey S. Fletcher

We have so long been subject to external criticism that we don't know how to react to internal criticism, because whereas the most enduring, positive and sensible response to the former is a united front – you shall not divide us, here we stand – responding to the latter is an entirely different ballgame.

This is my fear: that as a community, we don't know how to critique ourselves, and that this is dong us damage. Criticism, and specifically the criticism of both literary publications and the mainstream press, has so long been the weapon of the enemy that our first response on seeing it wielded internally is to call it the work of traitors. We have found strength in the creation of our own conventions and the hallowing of our own legends, flourishing to such an extent that, even if we are not yet accepted into the mainstream literary establishment, we are nonetheless part of the cultural mainstream. We are written about inaccurately, yet we are written about; and if there ever was a time when the whole genre seemed a precarious, faddish endeavour, then that time is surely past.

Blog post: Criticism in SFF and YA ~ Foz Meadows

There are a lot of films where I play characters that are about the windows to the interior person rather than the exterior. ~ Emmanuelle Beart

Unlike a book or a film depression doesn't have to be about something. ~ Matt Haig

Exposition, criticism, appreciation, is work for second-rate minds. I ~ G.H. Hardy

February 5: Laurence Olivier, his agent Cecil Tennant, and playwright Terence Rattigan arrive in New York to discuss with Marilyn a film of The Sleeping Prince, to be produced in London with Olivier and Marilyn in the starring roles. ~ Carl Rollyson

I would love to do a film with a lot of humor in it: a comedy with pain instead of a painful film with some comedy. ~ Randa Haines

I like to make mechanical stuff. Once I make a film I have to do whatever I can make onstage I make it onstage. ~ Marjane Satrapi

I film normal-life subjects in natural settings that some people would consider uncinematic. But what I want to show is nature itself, as the truth of life. ~ Abbas Kiarostami

I am my own biggest critic. Before anyone else has criticized me, I have already criticized myself. But for the rest of my life, I am going to be with me and I don't want to spend my life with someone who is always critical. So I am going to stop being my own critic. It's high time that I accept all the great things about me. ~ C. JoyBell C.

There are two things you can't argue in film: comedy and eroticism. If something doesn't make you laugh, no one can tell you why it's funny, and it's difficult to reason someone out of an erection. ~ Roger Ebert

Dear Julie:
If I didn't feel that there is some good in your story, I wouldn't take the time to write a criticism of it. But there is some good in it, some points that make me feel that if you expend the effort(Look who's talking about expending the effort, I couldn't help thinking) you may well achieve your very worthy ambition.
First of all, you have an ear for cadence. Your sentences flow rather smoothly, and the continuity of your paragraphs is quite good.
Secondly, your imagery is sharp and clear-cut. I could smell that dank, rat-infested attic and I was more than a little in love with your pretty heroine by the time she emerged from her third paragraph. Furthermore, you occasionally achieve poetic effects which are pleasing.
But, my darling niece, your villains have nothing but venom in their souls, and your sympathetic characters are ready to step right off into Paradise without one spot to tarnish their purity. People aren't like that, Julie. Take a look around you.
Again, all your colors, your moods, your nusances, are essentially feminine, and it just doesn't ring true to be told that a man is responsible for them. No, Julie, it will be a long time before you speak and think and feel like an anguished old German musician of eighty! And, after all, what do you know about the problems of musical composition, or the life of an impoverised German laborer such as the landlord in his nineteenth-century environment? And how much do you know about s ~ Irene Hunt

When I was preparing for the film for tree weeks, with David Cronenberg, I had a lady friend come over. ~ John Lone

See, 'A Time to Kill' was the one I got famous off of. Big ka-boom, over one weekend. After that, I did films that I really wanted to do. ~ Matthew McConaughey

Keep it in mind, every second I
live, is only for you. Every
breath I take has your name on it.
And every moment I spend, is so
that I can be with you forever.
The day you cease to exist in my
life, my life will cease to exist
at all. #LIFE OF LOVE (Film) ~ Santonu Kumar Dhar

When you become old ... When you become old, you find yourself auditioning for the role of a lifetime; then, after interminable rehearsals, you're finally starring in a horror film--a talentless, irresponsible, and above all low-budget horror film, in which (as is the way with horror films) they're saving the worst for last. ~ Martin Amis

I'm trying to broaden my range and get different characters in each film. ~ Jodi Lyn O'Keefe

It says something about the curious nature of film, that someone can be so alive on screen, when we're all too aware that they've passed. it underscores how we're mortal, and films are immortal (commenting on the death of Heath Ledger) ~ Leonard Maltin

It's unseemly to criticize without knowledge. ~ James Clavell

Telling Alan Turing's story in a two-hour film was a tremendous challenge. It felt in some small way like our filmmaking version of breaking the enigma code. ~ Graham Moore

Our music over the years has been very cinematic. It's surprising we never really got into film soundtracks. ~ Martin Gore

In a film there a lot of people scheduling, you know. ~ Philip Seymour Hoffman

The fact is I'm not making a film in order to draw pictures or make images about Iran. ~ Asghar Farhadi

I was thinking about doing another film at the same time, which was the sequel to Basic Instinct and I just had a feeling that wasn't going to happen. You know, I just kind of read the writing on the wall. ~ Bruce Greenwood

When you go to a film festival as an audience member, it's so much fun. But when you bring your own film there, you carry so much stress and excitement. ~ Mora Stephens

My tastes range all over the place, from vocal standards to Motown to 70s funk & soul to 80s pop to film scores to artists like R.E.M., Ben Folds, Prince, Annie Lennox, the Police, Elvis Costello, Cat Stevens, the Ditty Bops, local bands that friends of mine are in, and the list goes on ... I have no single favorite genre or artist. ~ Stephanie D'Abruzzo

This was the time when all we could talk about was sentences, sentences - nothing else stirred us. Whatever happened in those days, whatever befell our regard, Clea and I couldn't rest until it had been converted into what we told ourselves were astonishingly unprecedented and charming sentences:
"Esther's cleavage is something to be noticed" or "You can't have a contemporary prison without contemporary furniture" or "I envision an art which will make criticism itself seem like a cognitive symptom, one which its sufferers define to themselves as taste but is in fact nothing of the sort" or "I said I want my eggs scrambled not destroyed."
At the explosion of such a sequence from our green young lips, we'd rashly scribble it on the wall of our apartment with a filthy wax pencil, or type it twenty-five times on the same sheet of paper and then photocopy the paper twenty-five times and then slice each page into twenty-five slices on the paper cutter in the photocopy shop and then scatter the resultant six hundred and twenty-five slips of paper throughout the streets of our city, fortunes without cookies. ~ Jonathan Lethem

For the time it takes to make the film, you are treated like a cosseted pet. Then the process is over, and you're hung out to dry. It's like being a mink. ~ Kyle MacLachlan