The very idea of photography is as Oliver Wendell Holmes said in the 19th century, "it's a mirror with a memory."
Errol MorrisI gave someone a perverse argument not so long ago about why advertising is better than movies. You want to hear it? Movies operate from a really disingenuous premise, that people are heroes. I know a lot of people and have had an opportunity over the years to observe them. Are they heroes...? Let's put it this way. Advertising tries something simpler and more believable: Products as heroes. I guess the idea is: When all else fails, put your faith in conditioner.
Errol MorrisI probably wouldn't have done [ Fred Leuchter story] if it was just a story about an executioner or a holocaust denier, but the combination of the two elements was irresistible. So yeah, I find it strange that there are so many people out there now.
Errol MorrisIt was assumed that you can't touch evangelical Christians. "Oh, they're the Republican Right. Stay away from those people. Don't even try to talk to them." Well, what's interesting is that there were evangelical Christians who were voting for Kerry. There were right-to-lifers who were voting for Kerry. And it's interesting to listen to the reasons why. To ignore that segment of the electorate is moronic. Particularly if you don't know who those people are, or what their concerns are.
Errol MorrisLong, long before I became a filmmaker I was talking to killers. Filmmaking was an after thought.
Errol MorrisI believe that we face incredible obstacles in our attempts to see the world. Everything in our nature tries to deny the world around us; to refabricate it in our own image; to reinvent it for our own benefit. And so, it becomes something of a challenge, a task, to recover (or at least attempt to recover) the real world despite all the impediments to that end.
Errol Morris