Brian De Palma Quotes

I don't see scary films. I certainly wouldn't go see my films.

Well, like any time you're shooting documentary stuff, you've got to be in the moment, and you've got to be able to be in control enough to capture what's happening

I've been obsessed with this kind of visual storytelling for quite a while, and I try to create material that allows me to explore it.

So I like to try to go back and develop pure visual storytelling. Because to me, it's one of the most exciting aspects of making movies and almost a lost art at this point

I love working with women. I think they're beautiful. I like to photograph them. I like the way they interact. When I was in high school I used to hang out with the girls. When I went to graduate school, I was in an all girls school. So it's something I'm very familiar with and quite fascinated by.

do i have political views? you bet! i think the best way to express them is in your work, and then get the hell off the stage

Yeah, I had an idea to make a very scary movie, based on a kind of serial murderer that preys on tourists.

When you make a movie outside the system and it's successful critically or a moderate financial success, you usually have to go back into the system and make a big hit

You know, I listen to contemporary music all the time

I hadn't done just a straight-out comedy in a long time, just letting an ensemble do really good character acting, having them carry the movie as in my earlier pictures

The camera lies all the time; lies 24 times/second.

And I always had this idea for making a movie about a femme fatale, because I like these characters. They're a lot of fun, they're sexy, they're manipulative, they're dangerous.

Godard is incredibly brilliant, the things he says. Apparently here in France, the most interesting thing when a new film of his is going to come out are his press conferences, because he's so brilliant

However, I spent most of my time in a Quaker school.

I do like directing other people's material.

I have swum against the stream all my life. It's not something I feel uncomfortable with. Is it difficult? Is it unpleasant? You bet.

And we've become very doubtful of our information sources, because they're all controlled by these huge multilateral corporations

That's what noir feels like to me. It feels like some kind of recurring dream, with very strong archetypes operating. You know, the guilty girl being pursued, falling, all kinds of stuff that we see in our dreams all the time

Everybody doesn't have to have a daughter who's a goodie-two-shoes.

I'm always looking for a kind of new musical entity to sort of move into a motion picture venue

I've been sort of traveling around the country for ten years talking about independent features.

You've got to remind yourself all the time that you're being measured against the fashions of the day, and if your work truly has any kind of staying power, well, people will be talking about it in 20, 30 years.

You know it's always amazed me - I think the most startling thing that's happened in the last couple of decades is that there is no sort of objective reporting anymore.

You never can predict things. I knew the movie Peducted would get a reaction, because it's showing a different vision of our soldiers in Iraq. All we ever get told is that they're valued and we support them, and as they're represented on television, they're true-blue and honorable. Which is true, for the most part.

It's always great to discover a new star of tomorrow

I mean, I don't mind promoting a movie, or talking to the press if it's going to be used in some way

The real trouble with film school is that the people teaching are so far out of the industry that they don't give the students an idea of what's happening.

However, ironically, I was baptized Presbyterian, and went to a Quaker school for twelve years

The biggest mistake in student films is that they are usually cast so badly, with friends and people the directors know. Actually you can cover a lot of bad direction with good acting

But, number one, I think traditional noir doesn't work in contemporary storytelling because we don't live in that world anymore