A Quote by Thelma Schoonmaker
Emeric [Pressburger] was completely cosmopolitan. That's what makes their [with Michael Powell] films so special. Neither of them thought twice about making a film about a friendship between an Englishman and a German during the Blitz. They were genius.
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I love visual stylists like Bob Fosse and Vincente Minnelli and Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger with The Red Shoes and The Tales of Hoffman.
Michael Powell always used to say 'I'm a typical Englishman'. He was and he wasn't. He was very cosmopolitan and spent a lot of time in Europe.
There have been innumerable films about film-making, but Otto e Mezzo was a film about the processes of thinking about making a film -- certainly the most enjoyable part of any cinema creation.
There's something that happens where you go, if you're lucky, goodness me, from film to another film to another film. And you can sort of feel that if you step off that treadmill, it might all go horribly wrong and you might never be employed again, you know. And I suddenly thought that that's not necessarily the case. And I also thought we make drama as actors about people in the world and that if you are on that treadmill, you start making films about other films.
I wasn't one of those girls who always dreamed of being an actress. I went to a normal school and then these film auditioners turned up when I was nine. Then I just fell into this whirlwind. I had lots of times when I thought: 'Woah, woah, hang on - I'm not completely sure about this.' I didn't come from a background of films. I didn't even really ever watch films. The fact is, my parents weren't into that stuff, and neither was I.
Against the vast majority of my countrymen, even at this moment, in the name of humanity and civilization, I protest against our share in the destruction of Germany. A month ago Europe was a peaceful comity of nations; if an Englishman killed a German, he was hanged. Now, if an Englishman kills a German, or if a German kills an Englishman, he is a patriot, who has deserved well of his country.
The experimental film scene was very much misogynistic as well. I don't know if you have read what little attention was given to the films of Joyce Wieland, who was the wife of Michael Snow. Michael was the "genius" and she was not. If you look at the films they're wonderful, but very different. Michael was very proud of the films too, so it was not coming from him. It was coming from the general environment. I think both Chantal Akerman and I shared that. We wanted to find a language, which was the language of women.
Michael's Powell art director was a painter and they had a wonderful friendship and artistic understanding. Michael himself, in the way he designed his own house, it was always with bright colours. Very un-English!
I don't come from a film background. I haven't learned anything about films or film-making. But I have a thirst to know everything about my profession. I want to learn about cinematography, about editing, about music recordings, about post-production. So when people in the know talk, I willingly listen.
Walt Disney wasn't making films for kids. Neither were the Muppets. A lot of the great, really cool films, they weren't making them for kids.
I often find in the film world, that it's very self-referring. If you talk to someone about films, they talk about them in terms of other films - rather than as something that happened to them in their life. And I'm really keen to get back to film as a reference to real things, not necessarily to other films.
When I was in my 20s and 30s, there was such a variety and diversity of types of films that you could see. So many of them were really more about the human condition and about relationships between people, and they were smaller films that had a much greater impact on me as a human being.
I went to a British Council event a while back and there were lots of German professors of literature. About half of them were convinced I had a German sense of humour and the other half were sure it was British. They are probably still arguing about it now.
I like to think I'm making films in the film business where movies are making enough numbers for the studios to let me keep working, but you also want those films to have content that makes you proud you made the film. That's not easy, but it's a fun puzzle to figure out.
I learned that a real friendship is not about what you can get, but what you can give. Real friendship is about making sacrifices and investing in people to help them improve their lives.
I don't talk about films even after I sign them because between the signing and the shooting, anything can happen. I am not superstitious, it's just that I don't like talking about a film that is not completed.
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