a steady diet of mass culture is a form of deprivation.

Art doesn't come in measured quantities: it's got to be too much or it's not enough.

Reality, like God and History, tends to direct people to wherever they want to go.

McLuhanism and the media have broken the back of the book business; they've freed people from the shame of not reading. They've rationalized becoming stupid and watching television.

If there's anything to learn from the history of movies, it's that corruption leads to further corruption, not to innocence.

It's sometimes discouraging to see all of a director's movies, because there's so much repetition. The auteurists took this to be a sign of a director's artistry, that you could recognize his movies. But it can also be a sign that he's a hack.

If it took some effort to see old movies, we might try to find out which were the good ones, and if people saw only the good ones maybe they would still respect old movies. As it is, people sit and watch movies that audiences walked out on thirty years ago.