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" When we were making the movie, winning awards for it wasn't the point at all. We didn't even have an American distributor. "

Michel Hazanavicius

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" There's always been a struggle with filmmakers between art and industry, and you have to find a balance. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" When you look at the early-'30s movies, like King Kong, the codes of acting are very similar to those of silent movies. In some of the silent movies - the good ones, the ones done by the best directors - the acting is very, very natural. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" Sure, I watched a lot of Hollywood movies. Maybe I've seen more Hollywood movies than French movies. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" But sometimes I think you have to try to do things that people don't think are doable. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" When you write a script that you've felt in your soul for a long time, you can't ask the actors to go through the same emotions. You have to do part of the job to make things as easy as possible for them. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" If you try to make a silent movie with a normal script and you just pull out the dialogue, you will have big problems with the actors because you will ask them to tell a story that you don't know. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I always loved silent movies. I was not a specialist, but I loved them. And when I started directing, I became really fascinated by the format - how it works, the device of the silent movie. It's not the same form of expression as a talkie. The lack of sounds makes you participate in the storytelling. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I try to respect the rules of the silent movies and I tried to make signification to make sense, and also the crew were very good and the fact that we shot in LA in the real Hollywood, studios and houses. We shot in the bed of Mary Pickford, and you cannot be any more accurate than that, so that helped a lot. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I watched a lot of silent directors who were absolutely great like John Ford and Fritz Lang, Tod Browning, and also some very modern directors like The Coen Brothers. The directors take the freedom within their own movies to be melodramatic or funny when they chose to be. They do whatever they want and they don't care about the genre. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" Silence is a universal language. It's like music or painting. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" When you do not have the dialogue to explain things, you will use everything to show and to tell the story. I think that this is what makes you believe that it is impeccable. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" When you're with your wife, you don't say I love you to your wife every day but the ways you look at her and your actions are another way to communicate. Don't focus on dialogue, only focus on what you're expressing. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" Hollywood is much more than America. Hollywood belongs to all of the planet. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I think being a foreigner and talking about Hollywood allowed me to use some cliches and some references that an American would maybe not use. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" It's just incredible. When you're French, coming from a non-English language country, you don't even dream about Oscar recognition or nominations. It's just beyond the dream. It's something very, very special and unique. It's the highest recognition any filmmaker could dream of. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I thought 'The Artist' was a perfect way to find a good balance. The artistic challenge is obvious because the film is black-and-white and its silent, but I did my best to make the movie accessible and easy to watch. I really don't want to make elitist movies. I really try hard to work for the audience. Audiences are smart. They get everything. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I always try to make popular films. Even in black-and-white and silent. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I think we are at the very beginning of high changes, not only in terms of digital film, but in the way the movies will be screened, whether they'll be screened on phones, on computers - on everything. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" It's about storytelling. The story is told through images. So with the cast, I had to make sure that the emotions were readable without sound... I know some great actors, if you turn off the sound, you don't really know what they're saying. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" I love silent cinema but don't hold it sacred. Like any branch of film there are some very boring films alongside the masterpieces. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" But I don't think of myself as a foreigner or a Frenchman! I just think of myself as a director. Whether I'm French or Australian or whatever, it's really not important. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" Sometimes when an actor says something almost perfect, but you know you have to edit it, if you tell them to change something immediately, it will come out great. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" The fact that I made a special movie with an old-fashioned style - even if it's a mix between with modern and old-fashioned things - must mean I feel both ways about change. In a way I'm resisting, but in a way adapting myself to the times. "

Michel Hazanavicius

" This is the problem with language, and this is what makes silent movies fun, because the connection with them, me or the audience is not with the language. There's no question of interpretation of what we are saying it's just about feeling. You create your own story. "

Michel Hazanavicius