Quotes from Paul Schrader

There's no escape. I'm God's only man.

You think it's a blessing to know what God wants? I'll tell you what he wants. He wants to push me over! Can't he see what's inside of me? All my sins.

'Taxi Driver' wasn't autobiographical in terms of the actual events, but I did draw on my own mental state.

I teach a course in screenwriting at Columbia, but I've never taken a course and I've never read a book about it!

As screenwriters, we struggle with our own success. We have wallpapered our world and now we can't get anyone to notice the picture we just hung.

I was raised as a Calvinist, which is doctrine-driven. And though there are many things wrong with Calvinism, you are at least encouraged to argue about things.

Now I see it clearly. My whole life has pointed in one direction. I see that now. There never has been any choice for me.

Those artists who say that somehow therapy or analysis will thwart their creativity are completely misinformed. It's absolutely the opposite: it opens closed doors.

The clock is impotent; mechanical time does not affect those living in an eternal present.

I still think like a critic, and I still analyze films like a critic. However, it's not possible to write criticism if you're making films.

Nobody has shot a strip club in black and white in a long time.

People who act against their own best interests are interesting characters.

I want to be happy; why do I do things that make me unhappy?

Ultimately, it's an illusion that you can understand yourself.

The only economic paradigm that movies have ever known is capitalism. There were no church sponsors or state patronage. The idea was that if you'd pay to see it, we'll make it for you.

If you write interesting roles, you get interesting people to play them. If you write roles that are full of nuance and contradiction and have interesting dialog, actors are drawn to that.

Screenplays are not works of art. They are invitations to others to collaborate on a work of art.

Someday a real rain will come and wash all this scum off the streets.

You talkin' to me? You talkin' to me? You talkin' to me? Then who the hell else are you talkin' to? You talkin' to me? Well I'm the only one here.

The secret of the creative life is to feel at ease with your own embarrassment.

The clock is impotent; mechanical time does not affect those living in an eternal present.

Twelve hours of work and I still can't sleep.Days go on and on... They don't end.

This distinction between form and experience is not pedantic, but fundamental: a form can express the Transcendent, an experience cannot. A form can express the common ground in which all things share. An experience can only express one man's reaction to that common ground.

That's the secret of creativity. You have to steal around. If you keep going back to that same 7-Eleven, they're going to catch you. So you go over to the floral shop, the gas station that nobody ever goes to, and you steal all this shit, and you put it together and people say, "Wow." They think it's yours.