Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" People think I have an interest in comics, but I'm only interested in comics from the '40s, like 'Donald Duck' comics. "
Terry Zwigoff
Comics
Think
Only
Related Quotes:
" A lot of things I have turned down ended up being a big embarrassment. Like that script, 'The Beaver.' I thought that was one of the worst scripts I had ever read. But everyone said, 'Ooh it's on the Black List.' Yeah, well, good for it. They're a bunch of idiots. I saw the final film, and there were no surprises. "
Terry Zwigoff
Down
Black
Good
" The films I want to make, I really want to be passionate about. "
Terry Zwigoff
Make
Passionate
Really
" Maybe if I found something I was really passionate about, which is entirely possible, I would make another documentary, but it's not a good career choice for anybody. I don't recommend it. "
Terry Zwigoff
Passionate
Good
Choice
" Because I found myself telling the story of his family to people without the visual aids that I was able to employ by filming them eventually. But I very much knew exactly what I was going to do. "
Terry Zwigoff
Myself
Family
Story
" Luckily, he was in the process of moving to France at the time, anyway. But if he had stayed in the States, I don't know how he would have handled that, because it was getting pretty crazy. I mean, a celebrity which he really did not welcome. And I can't blame him. "
Terry Zwigoff
Moving
Welcome
Time
" I gotta tell you, I don't have many close friends, and if I do wind up making friends with somebody, it takes me a long time, usually. "
Terry Zwigoff
You
Friends
Long
" I did turn down 'The Virgin Suicides.' I talked to the producers about it, and I just honestly told them that I didn't get it. Is it supposed to be funny, is it a thriller, what is it? "
Terry Zwigoff
Turn
Thriller
Just
" Whereas my producer literally worked on this thing for 10 years and because I gave that presenter credit to David Lynch, she to this day never gets credit. It really kills me. "
Terry Zwigoff
Years
Me
Credit
" I'm not trying to be self-serving, but you know, you get to Hollywood, and if you want to make something big and loud and dumb, it's pretty easy. It's very hard to go down there and make a film like 'Sideways,' which I thought was a great film. They don't want to make films like that anymore, even though that film was very successful. "
Terry Zwigoff
Thought
Know
Successful
" A good script and perfect casting, that's 90 percent of the work. "
Terry Zwigoff
Perfect
Good
Percent
" When I went around promoting 'Crumb,' there would be days I'd wake up in, like, Houston or Cleveland, and I'd step outside the hotel and get no idea where I was. It all looks the same: one big corporate, consumer theme park. It's all, 'Here's the Starbucks, and here's the Gap, and we'll go over to Banana Republic and the Cineplex.' "
Terry Zwigoff
Starbucks
Hotel
Looks
" I hope they get something of interest out of it, but I'd rather they all hate it and I like it, instead of vice versa... I make films to please myself first, and if the audience likes them, all the better. "
Terry Zwigoff
Hope
Better
Audience
" Well, that was certainly - to me, until we could film in Charles' room, I didn't even want to bother filming anything else. And in fact, I did hold off and that was the first thing we filmed. "
Terry Zwigoff
Well
Film
Want
" If I start paying attention to the mechanics of a film while watching it, then it's generally a bad film. "
Terry Zwigoff
Attention
Film
Bad
" I was inspired to do anything I could to get out of what I was doing... today, I'm motivated to pay the bills. "
Terry Zwigoff
Anything
Doing
Inspired
" People like light and silly, and they like stuff that's really energetic, and you get a character in a film bouncing around and screaming, people laugh. That's all it takes. I don't find that funny. To me, what's funny is dialogue and nuance of character and performance. "
Terry Zwigoff
Laugh
Character
People
" Certain types of films will never test well. My films never seem to test well. "
Terry Zwigoff
Seem
Will
Well
" I don't like most Christmas movies. They're pretty bad, though they seem to make tons of money anyway. Like this movie 'Elf,' I got the script for that, and I turned it down right away. Against my wife's better judgment. "
Terry Zwigoff
Christmas
Wife
Movies
" And I sense it was a rather constructed, almost half narrative fiction film in some ways. A lot of it was staged and manipulated to get those things in there that I knew to be strong. "
Terry Zwigoff
Strong
Be Strong
Film
" If I see my films described as 'quirky' or, even worse, 'snarky' one more time, I'm going to probably seriously consider an early retirement. All these years, I've labored under the conceit that they were "darkly humorous.' "
Terry Zwigoff
Retirement
Early
Time
" So I told Robert from the start that if we couldn't get Charles and Max to take part, but especially Charles, that I didn't want to make the film. So would he call his mother and talk to Charles and see if Charles would at all be interested. "
Terry Zwigoff
See
Talk
Start
" I've stopped going to see art films because every critic gives them four stars and say things like 'masterpiece,' 'spellbinding' and 'mesmerizing.' I mean, they're doing that with my film, but I don't want to use those blurbs. Critical reviews aren't worth too much anymore because just about every film can get one or two of them. "
Terry Zwigoff
Doing
Art
Worth
" I collect old Coon Chicken Inn memorabilia. I collect black memorabilia, like old minstrel posters. It was a real place. There was one in Seattle, one in Portland, and one in Salt Lake City. They started in 1925, and then they went out of business around 1958. "
Terry Zwigoff
Black
Business
Place
" I think the other misconceptions when the film came out, he was very upset that it was so widely released and so widely seen. And neither one of us - well, I think I had hopes it would be, 'cause I really did think it was something special. "
Terry Zwigoff
Upset
Well
Film
" That would be getting up at 5 am... I don't understand why film's shoot such brutal hours. I think it'd be worth it to not be so strictly cost-effective and have an 8 hour day. The film's would benefit in the end. "
Terry Zwigoff
Understand
Think
Worth
" The things I want to make into a film, they're personal, esoteric things, and I don't expect anyone else to like them as much as I do. I generally like my films more than anybody else will. "
Terry Zwigoff
Want
Will
Personal
" For a long time, there was this rumor that I turned down doing 'Austin Powers,' which is not true. While they did send me the script, I don't think I was ever a serious consideration to direct it. I'm sure they probably sent it to 20 others as well. "
Terry Zwigoff
Long
Serious
Doing
" Crumb was such an influence on me. He's such a visionary, such a great artist, that he so shaped my artistic sensibilities on a certain level that I do owe everything to him. The way I see the world is largely changed by him. "
Terry Zwigoff
See
Artist
Great
" The first scene I ever shot for 'Louie Bluie,' on that first day, I had never seen the camera before. I didn't know where to put it. I just knew what was strong about these guys and what I wanted to capture, so I tried to work backward from there and figure it out. Trial and error. Hopefully I got a little bit better at it. "
Terry Zwigoff
Know
Strong
Better
" I never saw a department store Santa as a kid. My mother was afraid to take me. "
Terry Zwigoff
Mother
Afraid
Me