Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
My films, no one else will do.
If we don't tell our own stories, no one else will.
It is because my roots are so strong that I can fly.
Every frame and every scene has to have an intention.
No one goes to Pakistan to make movies. You stick out.
Humility is not a trait I often associate with America.
Every film is a political act; it's how you see the world.
Never take no for answer, and try to make films that turn you on.
Truth is much stranger than fiction and, often, much more powerful.
Truth is more peculiar than fiction. Life is really a startling place.
It's only at this age that I can say the word 'art' without flinching.
I grew up in a small town in India, but through books I knew the world.
I'm inspired by people that are marginal. I'm excited by their resilience.
In our house we say 'adolescence' is a western word. We don't believe in it.
My family is vital to me - just the sense of being surrounded by no pretension.
The film-school mantra is that if you don't tell your own stories, nobody will.
As the director of a film, as the story teller, you have to keep your voice alive.
I am an independent film-maker first and foremost. I have always cut my own cloth.
I think I am kind of put on this Earth to speak of being between worlds in my films.
My close friends call me the bulldozer who never says no. I have never not made a film.
Never treat anything you do as a stepping stone. Do it fully, and follow it completely.
I dream of living off the land completely - in vain, because the monkeys eat everything.
Creative freedom is an imperative for me, but it doesn't really exist in a Hollywood game.
I don't think boldness should be associated with showing off skin. It's not the basis of boldness.
'Salaam Bombay' didn't put a halo on the poor. Instead, it said that they will teach us how to live.
I grew up in a very small town which is remote even by Indian standards. I always dreamed of the world.
From Vietnam's 'Deer Hunter' to Iraq, films are never about the person who has had his house destroyed.
Post 9/11, so much has changed in New York that it does not give you that homely feeling which it did before.
My family is almost exactly like the one in 'Monsoon Wedding'. We are very open, fairly liberal, loud people.
I'm not interested in passion and love for their own sake - without the struggle of life, they're just fluff.
What is really important to me is a sense of humour and a mischief about life. Life is just too boring otherwise.
Life is short, so I'm knowing exactly where I'm putting my time. I don't want to do things that I don't have to do.
We have not learned the lessons of 9/11. This wrongful suspicion, racial hatred, and profiling is what I keep seeing.
I've never sought to be on an A-list. I've done my own thing and my own thing has thankfully now brought me an audience.
We never see the fancy schools with the blazers and ties in films about Africa! But, in fact, we too have class and elitism.
Americans are not used to being bombed in their beds, but if you come from anywhere outside America, it's not highly unusual.
I'm a self-taught landscape gardener; it's a real passion of mine. It's what I do in my spare time because trees don't ask questions!
We want the diversity of the world that is around us represented both in front of and behind the camera, and on our screens as a result.
It took me three years to learn to dress in the American way, especially in winter. That was just like me. I barely wear socks even now.
I want to question what the outside is and who defines it. I often find those that are considered to be on the outside extremely inspiring.
I am still attracted to stories about people who are considered to be on the outside of society. I still seek inspiration from those stories.
We all know the power of film; we all know there's almost nothing more powerful than to see people on film that look and talk like you, like we do.
Making films is about having absolute and foolish confidence; the challenge for all of us is to have the heart of a poet and the skin of an elephant.
In Uganda, I am surrounded, unfortunately, by evangelicals; I can't bear it. Every night I hear the chants of Baptists urging people to be born again.
I love the idea that it doesn't take one person only to achieve your potential. It takes a village, it takes a community, a street, a teacher, a mother.
I came from the school of cinema verite documentaries, which was: Do not manipulate reality as it was happening but create a narrative in the editing room.
I think in the last thirty years, the rich have gotten richer and the poor have gotten poorer. It is not something that you can see with rose-colored glasses.
I know what it's like to be in one place and dream of another. I also know what it's like to feel that nostalgia is a fairly useless thing because it is stasis.
Christmas lights may be the loneliest thing for me, especially if you mix them up with reindeers and sleighs. I feel alone. I feel isolated. I feel I do not belong.
What's nice about what we have is when you enter the set, the world of film, it becomes this real cocoon, very different from all the publicity. That's the fun part.