Quotes from Mani Ratnam

The journey of filmmaking is so amazing. You start off with great confidence, and develop insecurity at the time of release. When you are ready with the finished product, you are constantly wondering if you have been honest to the story you started out with, if you got what you wanted. One is too close to the project by then to be objective.

Sometimes in a large family, you get taken to a movie and there just isn't enough space or not enough tickets and you get left out. Those are the movies you remember because you never got to see them!

My films are as much for the people as they are for me. The reception affects me, but doesn't change me as a person. That's important.

I am more comfortable with Tamil than Hindi.

Before the release of any film, I feel like a beginner.

Art is something in which you are never an expert at any point of time. It's something you hone all the time and something which is elusive all the time.

I am not worried about people's expectations. I just want to get the film right.

Sometimes, I think filmmakers grab too much from real life.

As a filmmaker, every tool you get to tell the scene better is important.

Once the film is released, once my job is over, I can't see the film again.

Format is just the language. Content is the only thing that is important. Form is like handwriting. Whether you write in a scribble or clean handwriting or type it, the content remains the same. You want to write in clean hand, in a kind of a clear format only because it is aesthetically pleasing. I can scribble, that's also fine.

If you take 'Agni Natchathiram,' it is about two half-brothers and their emotions and those are genuine, which can be made into a very hard-hitting film just that it can be presented in an entertaining fashion. Similarly with 'OK Kanmani,' it is a genuine film; it is not a flippant film just for commercial purposes.

When I am making a film, it's very instinctive, it's not preset.

A written word gets preserved in so many forms. But movies which comprise of both audio and visuals have to be done with care and a lot more details.

What I feel is great acting might be rubbish for another filmmaker. There is no right or wrong way to do it. It all boils down to the trust between an actor and a director.

Whatever film you do, even if it's a children's film, you do with the same amount of sincerity.

I'm not saying that every song has to be an all-time hit or the greatest ever music. That's not what you should set out to do. But you have to find out what will work best for a particular story or theme or backdrop, and discuss how not to make it a cliche or fall into such traps.

When you break new grounds and try to do something different, it's always a high. I remember the first time we did a whole song in slow motion with lipsync for 'Geetanjali.' It was not prevalent at that time. We just had a method and we tried to do that. We weren't sure whether it was going to work, but that is the kind of risk you take.

Film fests are an opportunity to see different kinds of films that you usually don't get to watch. When I'm part of a jury, then I get to judge films, but otherwise I attend festivals to watch two or three films a day and network with a gathering of cinema lovers from all over.

Even in a conservative society like Chennai, youngsters don't feel bound by conventions anymore.

Writing is nagging, fascinating, troublesome and exciting.

When I did my first film, I had a fair idea of what I liked and what I didn't while watching an actor in front of the camera. After I finished the film, I thought I had exhausted everything I knew. As I moved from one story, setting and character to another, I discovered something new.

A song is a burden that you carry happily.

Censorship should never go. But we can always give a little more space to the director.