Quotes About Filmmaking

When I was finishing 'Now You See Me 2,' I remember thinking about exploring the Asian-American identity side of my brain.

I always, as a firm rule, make my movies based on how inexpensively I can make them because that means the more freedom I'm going to have.

My first love was always direction; I had worked hard as a film-maker but not as an actor.

Directing is my first love; turning an actor was rather accidental.

To make films, it always begins with two words: what and how. First of all, you have to find a story, or what are you going to tell? And you have to find a way to tell it visually.

I'm not a cineaste. I've made so few films. Sometimes it feels each one is the last one or the first one.

I managed to get a short film with Channel 4 Films. I cast a young actor who'd done a bit of television before, a young actor called Ewan McGregor. That was very first thing. This writer had won this competition, and I made this little short, black and white movie. I think for both Ewan and I it was the start of our careers.

Every time I do one I feel like I've never really quite learned anything. I always find that when I'm making a film, I find it a little bit like I'm doing it for the first time.

What's so great about DreamWorks is that it's run by filmmakers who believe that if it's not broke, don't fix it.

When I was young and it was someone's birthday, I didn't have the money to buy nice presents so I would take my mom's camera and make a movie parody for whoever's birthday it was. When I'd show it them, they'd die laughing. That reaction was a high for me, and I loved that feeling.

I always like to hang out with whoever's directing and watch what they do. I hang out at Video Village, the area where the directors and the writers and script advisors are.

I've always been interested in directing, writing, and producing, so when I went behind the scenes, it was like a whole new world that I got to experience.

After a couple of attempts at making shorts, I decided to make a feature film with a friend, Tom Hall, whom I've worked with ever since.

It's with pleasure that I'm putting film-making aside. I never enjoyed making films. I didn't like the whole film world - an invented, unreal world whose values are completely different to those I'm used to.

There is no reason why challenging themes and engaging stories have to be mutually exclusive - in fact, each can fuel the other. As a filmmaker, I want to entertain people first and foremost. If out of that comes a greater awareness and understanding of a time or a circumstance, then the hope is that change can happen.

I like superhero films, and I love Star Wars movies, but I want to make sure there's a wide diaspora of films getting made.

When I was making short films, I didn't see a way to give them a wider reach or earn revenue out of it.

The real kudos need to go to my family, who have supported my crazy filmmaking dreams - from Melbourne, to L.A., England and the wider world - by supporting my projects and passions over the past years.

No other aspect of filmmaking has tempted me to do a film other than the script and the story itself.

I feel like I'm still learning a lot. I think there's a tendency for people who are just doing their first couple of films that I see now where they seem to be really resentful of the technical limitations that come along with filmmaking.

I was drawn to painting and filmmaking because I was interested in communicating visually, which spills over into my tendencies as a writer.

I have a million funny ideas for sketches, but I don't want to spend tens of thousands of dollars shooting them.

What I realized is that it doesn't matter how big or small your film is. The actual filmmaking process, the actual storytelling, it's still the same thing. It's still all about creating characters that you like and creating moments that get you excited or get you tense.

I financed and made my own films from the start. My path has been autonomous and independent, so I don't have any horror stories about glass ceilings and expectations and tense studio meetings.