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If you're doing a biography, you try to stay as accurate as possible to reality. But you really don't know what was going on in the person's mind. You just know what was going on in the minds of people around him.
I had one well known director who kept saying, "Now Clint, this is what ...." And I'd say, "I know. I read the script. I'm the one who cast you as the director. Let me show you and you'll correct me if I'm wrong."
I pay tribute to the writing always. The writer is a creative artist and the director is an interpretive artist and the actors are interpretive. You take zero and make it into something, that's always amazing to me.
I never expect anything. I am always amazed at why anybody goes to any movie or why anybody doesn't go to any movie. Any movie you make, you make it because you're hoping somebody wants to see it, but you never know.
I'd been trying to retire to the back of the camera for quite a few years. And then, in 1970, when I first started directing, I if I could pull this off, I can some day just move in back of the camera and stay there.
Scott Eastwood always came in and did a good job. And he's now graduated to better roles, and the chicks are all calling and asking where Scott is. They used to ask where I was. Now they're going, "What about Scott?"
I'm not a New Age person, but I do believe in meditation, and for that reason I've always liked the Buddhist religion. When I've been to Japan, I've been to Buddhist temples and meditated, and I found that rewarding.
The most gentle people in the world are macho males, people who are confident in their masculinity and have a feeling of well-being in themselves. They don't have to kick in doors, mistreat women, or make fun of gays.
You know when you're young and you see a play in high school, and the guys all have gray in their hair and they're trying to be old men and they have no idea what that's like? It's just that stupid the other way around.
I believe in my gut. Most people intellectualize their instincts away, but when you feel something, you have to go for it. A Fistful of Dollars was a great instinct for me, because here I was, a guy who's doing Rawhide.
Over the years, I realized there was a Republican philosophy that I liked. And then they lost it. And LIBERTARIANS had more of it. Because what I really believe is, let's spend a little more time leaving everybody alone.
I have been trying to retire to the back of the camera for quite a few years, and in 1970, when I first started directing, I said, 'If I could pull this off, I can some day move to the back of the camera and stay there.'
You have to teach yourself to act but Michael Chekhov will give you the necessary tools - and for me, Psychological Gesture and Centers are extremely valuable They work like a charm. I've used them all along and still do.
In America, instead of making the audience come to the film, the idea seems to be for you to go to the audience. They come up with the demographics for the film and then the film is made and sold strictly to that audience.
You definitely do not do films for that particular reason. You do them for yourself, for your satisfaction of creating this thing with characters and watching these characters take on real life - that's all you care about.
I've always felt that if I examine myself too much, I'll find out what I know and don't know, and I'll burst the bubble. I've gotten so lucky relying on my animal instincts, I'd rather keep a little bit of the animal alive.
When you're making a film you start living with it, and I find myself sitting down and figuring out a sound or melody that would go with a film, or a particular period. It's not brain surgery, you just kind of feel it along.
My uncle played rugby, and my dad played football, and they used to argue which game was the roughest - and everybody agreed rugby was. It's a great team sport, and to be successful, every person has to play in the same level.
I always like to try different things, different genres; stories that have a dramatic element and can generate conflict which I find appealing; where the characters have to overcome obstacles. That kind of thing is challenging.
There's really no way to teach you how to act, but there is a way to teach you how to teach yourself to act. That's kind of what it is; once you learn the little tricks that work for you, pretty soon you find yourself doing that.
In 'Gran Torino,' I play a guy who's racially offensive. But he learned. It shows that you're never too old to learn and embrace people that you don't understand to begin with. It seems like nobody else got that message, I guess.
The prospect of dating someone in her twenties becomes less appealing as you get older. At some point in your fife, your tolerance level goes down and you realize that, with someone much younger, there's nothing really to talk about.
The prospect of dating someone in her twenties becomes less appealing as you get older. At some point in your life, your tolerance level goes down and you realize that, with someone much younger, there's nothing really to talk about.
If you can make a good picture that actually has some substance, that's doubly good nowadays 'cause most everybody else is trying to address how many CGI plates we're gonna do, what little being is gonna come in from another asteroid.
I was forty the first time I directed. I formed a company in 1967, looking to the future. My dad taught me that whatever you do, do it well. Be the best at what you can do for that particular job in life. That always resonated with me.
As a movie actor, once you've become known, you're observed all the time so you don't get the chance to observe anymore. You still get a taste of life but it's not quite the same and there's something to be said for a more anonymous life.
I was always respectful of people who were deeply religious because I always felt that if they gave themselves to it, then it had to be important to them. But if you can go through life without it, that's OK, too. It's whatever suits you.
There are a lot of conservative people, a lot of moderate people, Republicans, Democrats, in Hollywood. It is just that the conservative people by the nature of the word itself play closer to the vest. They do not go around hot dogging it.
To me, life is like the back nine in golf. Sometimes you play better on the back nine. You may not be stronger, but hopefully you're wiser. And if you keep most of your marbles intact, you can add a note of wisdom to the coming generation.
When you're an actor, you're so busy: people are always coming up to you and pulling your collar, making sure that things fit, brushing your hair and you're always being yanked up, so finally when you're behind a camera, you're just a slob.
I don't see myself as conservative, but I'm not ultra-leftist. You build a philosophy of your own. I like the libertarian view, which is to leave everyone alone. Even as a kid, I was annoyed by people who wanted to tell everyone how to live.
I read every book there was on jazz, about the original players - King Oliver, Buddy Bolden and all those groups. At one time I was fairly well schooled in that... I could tell you who played where and when, historically, way before my time.
I don't like to see a president who is just out campaigning all year long or for the last four years. I'd like to see somebody who's going in the office. In fact, I'd like to not see them because that way you'd be sure that they'd be working.
I'd like to be a bigger and more knowledgeable person ten years from now than I am today. I think that for all of us as we grow older, we must discipline ourselves to continue expanding, broadening, learning, keeping our minds active and open.
Nobody wants to make something that displeases people, but once you make a film, that's out of your control and you can't think about that. You just have to follow your head and make sure that you're satisfied by putting down what you intended.
If you get a certain amount of notoriety for doing something, and you can stick to that type of project for the rest of your life and make a decent living, I think you still have a responsibility to stretch. Flexibility is what keeps you alive.
When you're making a movie, you can't think anybody will ever see it. You've just got to make a movie for the values it has. The greatest films were made because someone really wanted to make them. And, hopefully, the audience will show up, too.
Today, the only thing Hollywood swears by is space adventures because that's what goes over well. For my part, I trust my instinct and I make the films I believe in. If the public follows me, that's wonderful. If it doesn't follow, "c'est la vie.
I never look back and think too much about my films. I've done some work I've been proud of over the years but which of them is my favourite I really don't know. I could say the last one. I've had little jumps in my career like Unforgiven possibly.
I would just like to say something, ladies and gentlemen. Something that I think is very important. It is that, you, we - we own this country. We - we own it. It is not you owning it, and not politicians owning it. Politicians are employees of ours.
Hollywood, as everyone knows, glamorizes physical courage. . . . if I had to define courage myself, I wouldn't say it's about shooting people. I'd say it's the quality that stimulates people, that enables them to move ahead and look beyond themselves.
Music does have a very special place in my heart. I enjoy it very much. I suppose it is my first love and I do a lot of it. It seems to be when you are making a project it inspires you sometimes to jot down something that you think fits the situation.
I think being able to age gracefully is a very important talent. It is too late for me. The horse is out of the barn... In past generations, people would try to play younger than they really are. My trick is, I don't try to play younger than I really am.
I think as you get older, you find you can play more things because you're moving to a different category. You play a certain thing as a younger man, playing action roles like I did. Then I moved out, and I kept trying to do different things all the time.
I'd have to go for Donald Trump ... you know, 'cause Hillary Clinton is declared that she's gonna follow in Barack Obama's footsteps. There's been just too much funny business on both sides of the aisle. She's made a lot of dough out of being a politician.
The interesting thing with child actors is that kids are natural actors. They're wonderful actors, and most kids are acting all the time. They're imagining they're out in the yard playing. They're imagining that things happened, and they can get very vivid.
The cruelty of nature is you have to work out harder when you get older ... It should be the other way around: Work out hard when you're a kid you should be able to coast when you get older. But unfortunately you have to do more to stay in the same position.
God gave you a brain. Do the best you can with it. And you don't have to be Einstein, but Einstein was mentally tough. He believed what he believed. And he worked out things. And he argued with people who disagreed with him. But I'm sure he didn't call everybody jerks.
There was a stool there, and some fella kept asking me if I wanted to sit down. When I saw the stool sitting there, it gave me the idea. I'll just put the stool out there and I'll talk to Mr Obama and ask him why he didn't keep all of the promises he made to everybody.
There was a stool there, and some fella kept asking me if I wanted to sit down. When I saw the stool sitting there, it gave me the idea. I'll just put the stool out there and I'll talk to Mr. Obama and ask him why he didn't keep all of the promises he made to everybody.