Top 21 Quotes & Sayings by David Puttnam

Explore popular quotes and sayings by a British producer David Puttnam.

Last updated on April 20, 2025.

David Terence Puttnam, Baron Puttnam, CBE, HonFRSA, HonFRPS, MRIA is a British and Irish film producer, educator, environmentalist and former member of the House of Lords. His productions include Chariots of Fire, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture, The Mission, The Killing Fields, Local Hero, Midnight Express and Memphis Belle. He sat on the Labour benches in the House of Lords, although he was not principally a politician. In 2019 he was appointed chair to the select committee on democracy and digital technologies. The committee published its findings in its Digital Technology & the Resurrection of Trust report in June 2020.

British - Producer | Born: February 25, 1941

Source: Wikipedia

In the U.K., the history of regulation, certainly regulation of the media, is one in which, time and again, successive governments lacked the 'bottle' to enforce the powers that were available to them.

David Puttnam

What is certain is that plurality and diversity are not, and never can be, a natural 'byproduct' of unregulated market forces.

David Puttnam

Newspapers and their editors have to become as accountable as the rest of us - they are not 'a special case,' and they have only themselves to blame for having lost the argument for 'exceptionalism' - and with it the right to 'self-regulation.'

David Puttnam

As intelligent and responsible filmmakers, working in a free society, we have a duty to ensure that our chosen medium is a force for good. Especially in this ever-more complex and difficult world.

David Puttnam

A vital step for the technology sector is to signpost legitimate search options far more clearly and to delete links to sites that promote illegally sourced content.

David Puttnam

I absolutely refuse to accept the fact that any country in the world goes into a kind of film-making crisis. What happens is they lose confidence, they lose focus and the young film-makers of any particular generation can very easily get lost in that mix. It's happened in Italy, happened in France, happened in the U.K. during my lifetime.

David Puttnam

There's always a miasma of misinformation emerging from the higher education sector as to which are the 'best' courses to take. My advice would always be to ignore the perceived wisdom and look for the most reliable evidence on the ground.

David Puttnam

At its best, cinema does retain a remarkable ability to speak to people of every age, from every background, and in ways that almost any other art form in popular culture struggles to compete with.

David Puttnam

There is no education system in the world - none at all - that's better than its average teacher.

David Puttnam

Film and the other creative industries are being transformed by digital technologies.

David Puttnam

I'm not naive enough to pretend that on its own cinema can capture the very soul of significant social and cultural problems.

David Puttnam

My belief is that no movie, nothing in life, leaves people neutral. You either leave them up or you leave them down.

David Puttnam

At least in the West, politicians, corporations and media moguls can no longer take for granted their power to control the public discourse - and have it go unchallenged.

David Puttnam

Without any doubt at all, teacher quality is the fundamental differentiator. Not just, incidentally, of education, but I would argue, probably the biggest single differentiator of success for the nations of the 21st Century.

David Puttnam

Most parliamentarians don't have a clue as regards the challenges or the opportunities the games industry faces.

David Puttnam

The most important thing I think teachers can do for young people is to make them inquiring, is to ensure that they know how to gather information, that they check information and they take their information from a multiplicity of sources.

David Puttnam

I've always sensed what a script should sound like - even before the movie's been made

David Puttnam

There's always a miasma of misinformation emerging from the higher education sector as to which are the "best" courses to take. My advice would always be to ignore the perceived wisdom and look for the most reliable evidence on the ground.

David Puttnam

If it's not true, don't say it; if it's not right, don't do it.

David Puttnam