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" And if there was one title that could be applied to all my films, it would be 'Civil War' - not civil war in the way we know it, but the daily war that goes on between us all. "
Michael Haneke
Us
War
Civil War
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" I think it's a little simplistic to explain a work through the psychology of its author. In other words, that Haneke has emotional problems, so I don't have to take his films seriously. By using this argument, the viewer retreats from the challenges of the film. "
Michael Haneke
Think
Challenges
Problems
" People expect me to be dark and gloomy, then write that I'm a jolly chap, and after all, that is what I am. I think it's a case of an absolute romantic naivety that there should be a parallel between the work and the artist. "
Michael Haneke
I Am
People
Romantic
" Because I'm the author of my screenplays I know what I'm looking for. It's true that I can be stubborn in demanding that I get what I want, but it's also a question of working with patience and love. "
Michael Haneke
Love
Know
Looking
" At its best, film should be like a ski jump. It should give the viewer the option of taking flight, while the act of jumping is left up to him. "
Michael Haneke
Like
Flight
Film
" To me, it's far more efficient to mobilize the imagination. It's far more efficient to hear a creaking step, for example, than to see the face of a monster, which usually looks ridiculous, and where you know that the blood is ketchup. "
Michael Haneke
Me
You
Know
" A feature film is twenty-four lies per second. "
Michael Haneke
Feature
Film
Twenty-Four
" What I like are films that take me seriously, that don't treat me as more stupid than I am. "
Michael Haneke
Stupid
More
Me
" I never suffered from the absence of a father. On the contrary, as a child I was more inclined to see men as a disturbing factor. It made things difficult for me when I started working as a director. "
Michael Haneke
Child
See
Men
" Films for TV have to be much closer to the book, mainly because the objective with a TV movie that translates literature is to get the audience, after seeing this version, to pick up the book and read it themselves. My attitude is that TV can never really be any form of art, because it serves audience expectations. "
Michael Haneke
Never
Expectations
Book
" On the set I make jokes I can't get too involved, or it turns into sentimental soup. I try to keep it light. "
Michael Haneke
Keep
Light
Soup
" I've never let producers tell me what to do. Even when I was making television, I always did what I wanted to do, and if I couldn't, I didn't do it. It was a freedom that, these days, young directors starting out don't have. "
Michael Haneke
Television
Me
Always
" I make my films because I'm affected by a situation, by something that makes me want to reflect on it, that lends itself to an artistic reflection. I always aim to look directly at what I'm dealing with. I think it's a task of dramatic art to confront us with things that in the entertainment industry are usually swept under the rug. "
Michael Haneke
Me
Art
Look
" Mainstream cinema raises questions only to immediately provide an answer to them, so they can send the spectator home reassured. If we actually had those answers, then society would appear very different from what it is. "
Michael Haneke
Answer
Cinema
Home
" As a private person, professionally I am invisible. "
Michael Haneke
Person
I Am
Invisible
" Drama lives on conflict. If you're trying to deal with social issues seriously, there's no way of avoiding violence, which is so present in society. "
Michael Haneke
Violence
You
Trying
" It's a disease of critics that once they've labeled someone, it's very hard to change their perspective. It's laziness. "
Michael Haneke
Someone
Change
Perspective
" My father and I had a good relationship, it was very relaxed. He had a lot of humour. He looked a little bit like me, although he had no beard. He had the appearance of a very elegant British-looking man. "
Michael Haneke
Father
Relationship
Me
" There are really two types of laughter on the part of the spectator. There is the laughter of recognition - which means seeing things you're familiar with and laughing at yourself. But there's also hysterical laughter - a way of dealing with the things we see that upset us. "
Michael Haneke
Recognition
Laughter
Yourself
" To be perfectly honest, I think that as I'm growing older, I'm just growing more impatient. I'll be very happy if at some point people say, 'Michael's grown wiser and softer in his old age.' But we'll have to wait and see what my next project is. "
Michael Haneke
People
Think
Old Age
" It's unbearable when someone changes around you. Just imagine that your life partner changes, then it is difficult to cope with. Or your mother. Or your father. They were strong and now they're like a baby - it's not so funny. "
Michael Haneke
Funny
Mother
You
" It's impossible to consider living without ideals. However, when ideas lead to ideology, that's a very dangerous thing. Ideology then leads to creating the image of an enemy, and it leads to the murder and massacre that we've seen since the beginning of time. "
Michael Haneke
Beginning
Ideas
Impossible
" 'The White Ribbon' had to be in German because of the subject matter, that was clear. But in the case of 'Amour,' it could have taken place in any country. "
Michael Haneke
Matter
Place
White
" I try to get closer to reality, to get close to the contradictions. The cinema world can be a real world rather than a dream world. "
Michael Haneke
Try
World
Real
" You'll see more violence in any television crime series than you will in my films... Art is there to have a stimulating effect, if it earns its name. You have to be honest, that's the only thing. "
Michael Haneke
Violence
Name
Television
" I want to make it clear: it's not that I hate mainstream cinema. It's perfectly fine. There are a lot of people who need to escape, because they are in very difficult situations, so they have the right to escape from the world. But this has nothing to do with an art form. "
Michael Haneke
People
Art
Cinema
" What we're doing for another person is more important than what we're feeling for them. "
Michael Haneke
Feeling
Doing
More
" Films that are entertainments give simple answers but I think that's ultimately more cynical, as it denies the viewer room to think. If there are more answers at the end, then surely it is a richer experience. "
Michael Haneke
Simple
Think
Answers
" And I don't believe that children are innocent. In fact, no one seriously believes that. Just go to a playground and watch the kids playing in the sandbox! The romantic notion of the sweet child is simply the parents projecting their own wishes. "
Michael Haneke
Parents
Romantic
Own
" When I first envisioned 'Funny Games' in the mid-1990s, it was my intention to have an American audience watch the movie. It is a reaction to a certain American cinema, its violence, its naivety, the way American cinema toys with human beings. In many American films, violence is made consumable. "
Michael Haneke
Violence
Funny
Cinema
" Classicism becomes avant-garde when everyone else is doing their utmost to develop new stylistic forms. I think it's healthy to return to classical forms. "
Michael Haneke
New
Healthy
Everyone