Quotes

I think that the Internet is going to effect the most profound change on the entertainment industries combined. And we're all gonna be tuning into the most popular Internet show in the world, which will be coming from some place in Des Moines. We're all gonna lose our jobs. We're all gonna be on the Internet trying to find an audience.

Once a month the sky falls on my head, I come to and I see another movie I want to make.

[on winning the Best Director Oscar for Saving Private Ryan (1998)]: Am I allowed to say I really wanted this?

Before I go off and direct a movie I always look at 4 films. They tend to be: Seven Samurai (1954), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), It's a Wonderful Life (1946) and The Searchers (1956).

[on friend Joan Crawford]: She is five feet four, but she looks six feet on the screen. In a two-shot with anyone, even Gable, (Clark Gable), your eyes fix on her. She is imperious, yet with a childlike sparkle. She is haughty, yet tender. She has no great range as an actress, yet within the range she can perform better than any of her contemporaries.

I have made almost as many films in England as I have in America. I will come back to England again and again.

I would love to see the British film industry get back on its feet again.

I don't drink coffee. I've never had a cup of coffee in my entire life. That's something you probably don't know about me. I've hated the taste since I was a kid.

I dream for a living.

I'd rather direct than produce. Any day. And twice on Sunday.

Poltergeist (1982) is the darker side of my nature, it's me when I was scaring my younger sisters half to death. In Poltergeist, I wanted to terrify and I also wanted to amuse - I tried to mix the laughs and screams together.

With Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977), George (George Lucas) put the butter back into the popcorn.

I always like to think of the audience when I am directing. Because I am the audience.

The older I get, the more I look at movies as a moving miracle. Audiences are harder to please if you're just giving them special effects, but they're easy to please if it's a good story. The audience is also the toughest critic - a good story that exists in your world may not be the first choice for an audience. So I just do the best I can.

[When asked about being conflicted whether to make more artistic films, or more commercial films]: All the time, but when you have a story that is very commercial and simple, you have to find the art. You have to take the other elements of the film and make them as good as possible, and doing that will uplift the film.

Godzilla (Godzilla: King of the Monsters! (1956)) was the most masterful of all dinosaur movies because it made you believe it was really happening.

I don't work weekends. Weekends are for my kids. And I have dinner at home every night when I'm not physically directing a movie - I get home by six. I put the kids to bed and tell them stories and take them to school the next morning. I work basically from 9.30 to 5.30 and I'm strict about that.

I think every film I make that puts characters in jeopardy is me purging my own fears, sadly only to re-engage with them shortly after the release of the picture. I'll never make enough films to purge them all.

I'm as guilty as anyone, because I helped to herald the digital era with Jurassic Park (1993). But the danger is that it can be abused to the point where nothing is eye-popping any more. The difference between making Jaws (1975) 31 years ago and War of the Worlds (2005) is that today, anything I can imagine, I can realize on film. Then, when my mechanical shark was being repaired and I had to shoot something, I had to make the water scary. I relied on the audience's imagination, aided by where I put the camera. Today, it would be a digital shark. It would cost a hell of a lot more, but never break down. As a result, I probably would have used it four times as much, which would have made the film four times less scary. Jaws is scary because of what you don't see, not because of what you do. We need to bring the audience back into partnership with storytelling.

Being a movie-maker means you get to live many, many lifetimes. It's the same reason audiences go to movies, I think. When my daughter Sasha (Sasha Spielberg) was 5 years old, we would be watching something on TV and she'd point to a character on screen and say, "Daddy, that's me." Ten minutes later a new character would come on screen and she'd say, "No, Daddy. That's me." Throughout the movie she would pick different people to become. I think that's what we all do. We just don't say it as sweetly.

After a scary movie about the world almost ending, we can walk into the sunlight and say, "Wow, everything's still here. I'm OK!" We like to tease ourselves. Human beings have a need to get close to the edge and, when filmmakers or writers can take them to the edge, it feels like a dream where you're falling, but you wake up just before you hit the ground.

What I'm saying is that I believe in showmanship.

Times have changed. It's like when the first 747 landed at Los Angeles international airport: everybody thought flying through the sky was the most greatest marvel they had ever seen - floating through the air, seemingly in slow motion. Today we never even look at 747s. They're a dime a dozen and it's that way with the blockbuster. If there was one blockbuster every three years, it meant a lot more than when you have a blockbuster every three weeks. It's the job of each of these studios to market these movies as the must-see movie of the year, so they go after blockbuster status by creating a grand illusion. Sometimes they've got a real engine behind that grand illusion, meaning the movie is damned good and the audience will say they got their money's worth. Other times, the audience comes on the promise of seeing something they've never ever seen before and it becomes just another sci-fi action yarn and they feel disappointed.

I've learned that we can do just about anything under the sun with computers. So the question becomes, should we? Or, should we remind ourselves, as filmmakers, to be careful and remember that there is nothing more important than how a story is told? If storytelling becomes a byproduct of the digital revolution, then the medium itself is corrupted. On the other hand, if digital tools are simply a way to enhance a conventional story, then in that case, they can make telling that story easier. It's easier and more practical to show 20,000 soldiers in the Crimean War using computers, obviously. So, that's fine. But now, we have technology that can replace actors, or an entire performance in an already existing movie. We could cut out Humphrey Bogart and replace him with Vin Diesel, if somebody wanted. Who would want to? Well, there might be people who would. That's why we have to be careful. Movies reflect our cultural heritage from the period in time in which they were made. Therefore, altering them can destroy that historical perspective. That's disrespectful of history, which is a big issue for me. The situation is like walking a tightrope - we have to move forward, but we have to be careful.

I had dinner with the founder of Yahoo! about seven years ago in Japan. I had my son, who is now sixteen, he was much younger then. I took him to a tea house. We had Geishas, they were serving us tea and I had a little soki and we were talking. And he kept sitting across from me and he kept saying "Yahoo! You have to know what Yahoo!"... and he was going crazy over this thing called Yahoo! And I thought he was actually out of his brain. You know, because he kept talking about Yahoo! and I thought he was trying to say "Yahoo!" And he was, but I had no idea what he was building. And he was so thrilled with what was happening in his world. And this was way beyond my world at that time. And how I look back. I thought: God if I could have been a little bit nicer to that guy, he might have called me up and offered me a chance to invest early. (2002).

During an interview with Roger Ebert regarding his film Munich (2005) and the response from Jewish critics that claim it depicts Israeli and Palestinian causes as morally equivalent: Frankly, I think that's a stupid charge. The people who attack the movie based on 'moral equivalence' are some of the same people who say diplomacy itself is an exercise in 'moral equivalence' and that war is the only answer. That the only way to fight terrorism is to dehumanize the terrorists by asking no questions about who they are and where they come from. What I believe is, every act of terrorism requires a strong response, but we must also pay attention to the causes. That's why we have brains and the power to think passionately. Understanding does not require approval. Understanding is not the same as inaction. Understanding is a very muscular act. If I'm endorsing understanding and being attacked for that, then I am almost flattered.

I feel like I've been engaged to the British Empire since 1980 and tonight you have given me the ring knighthood.

What kept us going was the thought that David Lean, at 54, had done this every day for a year. David Lean was our criterion for survival - on filming Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) in Tunisia.

As long as there's been Transformers, I've been one of the biggest fans. And I always thought that somewhere in this genius concept, there was a movie.

I'll probably never win an Oscar, but I'll sure have a lot of fun! I really believe that movies are the great escape!

Duel (1971) was almost a once-in-a-lifetime story. You don't get stories like that all the time.

All those horrible, traumatic years I spent as a kid became what I draw from creatively today.

The person I enjoy working for more than anyone else is George Lucas. He's the best boss I ever had because he's the most talented boss I ever had.

If I weren't a director, I would want to be a film composer.

I interpret my dreams one way and make a movie out of them and people see my movies and make them part of their dreams.

At E3 games convention about partnership with EA: I am a gamer myself, and I really wanted to create a video game that I could play with my kids.

{On his behavior following the premiere of a new film] My ritual is total blackout. No radio, no television, no internet, no newspapers. I just want to hear one number, which is the Monday-morning number.

The most expensive habit in the world is celluloid, not heroin, and I need a fix every two years.

Disney is the birthplace of imagination and has always been as close to the worldwide audience as any company ever has.

[Receiving the Cecil B. DeMille award at the 66th Annual Golden Globe Awards] Whenever I try to tell a risky story, whether it's about sharks or dinosaurs, or about aliens or about history, I'll always be thinking, "Am I going to get away with this?" When I don't have that worry, I won't make that movie.

[on seeing The Godfather (1972) for the first time] I felt that I should quit, that there was no reason to continue directing because I would never reach that level of confidence.

[on Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)] Harrison became Indiana Jones in a millisecond. He came on set, he donned the hat and everything came with it; his laconic sense of humour, his willingness to take a punch...and get hurt by that punch. All the things that Harrison, George, Larry Kasdan and I originally created. He brought all this back to life as if no time had elapsed since the third movie. My favourite memories from the shoot are my deepening respect for Harrison, not only as an actor but as a dear friend. We've gone off and made other movies which mean our paths have not crossed all that often. I'm not the most social guy in the world and neither is Harrison, so we didn't spend much time together, but we actually became great buddies on this movie, more even than on the first three. It's the best thing that came out of this experience for me.

[on James Cameron] He gets a lot of points for being a techno-brat, but he is a very emotional storyteller.

I think most of my movies are personal movies. I think the most personal movie I've made is Schindler's List (1993). I think the second-most personal movie I have ever made is E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982). I also find The Color Purple (1985) to be a personal film for me. So I've made a number of personal films. But I haven't made a movie yet that is actually a mirror neuron of my factual life and I don't think I ever will. My sister wrote a script about our lives and that might come around again some day, but I've always stayed away from anything that is too biographical.

The one ingredient I bring to all of my films is the ability to listen to anybody who has a good idea on the production. I'm very collaborative with actors, with my writers, with my editor, my cinematographer, with Johnny Williams who does all of my scores. And I just think from a very young age my parents taught me probably the most valuable lesson of my life - sometimes it's better not to talk, but to listen.

I never know what I'm in for. Most of my presumptions about a production are usually wrong. For instance, with Schindler's List (1993) I was pretty certain that whatever came my way in Poland I could tolerate, and just put my camera between myself and the subject, and protect myself by creating my own aesthetic distance. And immediately, on the first day of shooting, that broke down. I didn't have that as a safety net and immediately I realized that that this was about to become the most personal professional experience of my life. It was a devastatingly insightful experience, but it's something I still haven't gotten over. I think back on the production of Schindler's List with very sad memories, because of the subject matter, not because of the working experience. The working experience was nearly perfect because everybody held on to each other in that production. We formed a circle. It was very therapeutic, and for a lot of people, it changed their lives. A lot of the actors, a lot of the crew, it changed their lives. It changed my life, for sure. But other productions I've gone into with a blythe spirit, thinking, This film's a pushover. It's often when I take that attitude, the movie turns around and runs over me as if it were a tank. So I've tried my best to stop second-guessing what the working experience is going to be like. Because I'm usually wrong.

My movies are all different. I've tried to make every movie as if it was made by a different director, because I'm very conscious of not wanting to impose a consistent style on subject matter that is not necessarily suited to that style. So I try to re-invent my own eye every time I tackle a new subject. But it's hard, because everybody has style. You can't help it. It just comes off you like pollen. I mean, if you're a bee, you're a bee, but at the same time I try very hard to work a little out of the box every time I make a choice. And I had to go back to a box that I had helped invent in the 1980s to accomplish the task of bringing Indiana Jones back to life in the 21st century. We went right back to the blazing Technicolor style of the first three installments. For Munich (2005), I certainly tried to bring an early-70s Hollywood style, a cinéma-vérité style, with zoom-lenses, and a lot of the tools that were used to make movies in the 70s, one of my favorites being The Day of the Jackal (1973), the Fred Zinnemann film. But I didn't want to update Indiana Jones to the 1950s beyond hair, makeup, costumes and cars. I wanted it to look very similar to the first three pictures.

I've never used John Williams to tell people how to feel. I use John Williams to enhance my vision and my thoughts emotionally from scene to scene. He'll signal when the shark is coming, which are the most famous single notes next to Beethoven's Fifth. In telling a story, I will use every tool in my arsenal. I will do anything in my power to communicate the best story as I know how.

[on Janusz Kaminski] I was watching television and saw his name on a TV movie, Wildflower (1991), that was beautifully photographed, so I called up the head of my TV department and asked him to consider hiring him to do a pilot we produced about the Civil War, Class of '61 (1993). The director agreed to use Janusz and he was great. I think Janusz has brought a lighting style to my movies that I'd never had before. Even Allen Daviau who had done three pictures with me, who I think is the greatest lighting cameraman in town. But Janusz brought more daring, dangerous light into my films. I set the camera. I do all the blocking. I choose the lenses. I compose everything. But Janusz, basically, is my lighting guy. And he's a master painter with light; he's made tremendous contributions to my work through his art.

[on if the soldier's journey is the ultimate hero's journey] - For one thing, I don't think that anybody in any war thinks of themselves as a hero. The minute anybody presumes that they are heroes, they get their boots taken away from them and buried in the sand. That's not going to happen.

In the re-creation of combat situations, and this is coming from a director who's never been in one, being mindful of what these veterans have actually gone through, you find that the biggest concern is that you don't look at war as a geopolitical endeavor. You look at war as something that is putting your best friend in jeopardy. You are responsible for the person in front of you and the person behind you, and the person to the left of you and the person to the right of you. Those are the small pods that will inadvertently create a hero, but that is someone else's observation, not the observation of those kids in the foxholes.