John Huston Quotes

• The directing of a picture involves coming out of your individual loneliness and taking a controlling part in putting together a small world.

  John Huston

  Loneliness, Together, World

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  60 Copy quote

• I don't try to guess what a million people will like. It's hard enough to know what I like.

  John Huston

  Movie, Inspiring, People

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

  47 Copy quote

• I prefer to think that God is not dead, just drunk.

  John Huston

  God, Drinking, Beer

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  23 Copy quote

• Most people never have to face the fact that at the right time and the right place they're capable of anything.

  John Huston

  People, Faces, Facts

  "Fictional character: Noah Cross". "Chinatown", www.imdb.com. 1974.

  30 Copy quote

• I relieve myself from the rigours of directing by casting the movie correctly.

  John Huston

  Casting, Rigour

  19 Copy quote

• A picture is made. You put a frame around it and move on. And one day you die. That is all there is to it.

  John Huston

  Moving, One Day, Made

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  31 Copy quote

• A work of art doesn't dare you to realize it. It germinates and gestates by itself.

  John Huston

  Art, Realizing, Dare

  1982 Reply to a tribute from the Directors Guild of America. Reported in Variety, 26 Apr.

  32 Copy quote

• Hollywood has always been a cage...a cage to catch our dreams

  John Huston

  Dream, Hollywood, Cages

  33 Copy quote

• Crime is a left- handed form of human endeavor.

  John Huston

  Left Hand, Crime, Form

  John Huston (1980). “An open book”, Alfred A. Knopf

  16 Copy quote

• When you make motion pictures, each picture is a life unto itself. When you finish and the picture is over, there's an understanding, a realization that we'll never be assembled this way again. That these relationships are severed forever and ever. And each of these films is a little life.

  John Huston

  Forever, Understanding, Realization

  18 Copy quote

• What to do when inspiration doesn't come; be careful not to spook, get the wind up, force things into position. You must wait around until the idea comes.

  John Huston

  Inspiration, Ideas, Wind

  25 Copy quote

• You walk through a series of arches, so to speak, and then, presently, at the end of a corridor, a door opens and you see backward through time, and you feel the flow of time, and realize you are only part of a great nameless procession.

  John Huston

  Doors, Arches, Flow

  68 Copy quote

• I am more lost in wonder than ever.

  John Huston

  Wonder, Lost, Awe

  7 Copy quote

• Even Michelangelo on his deathbed thought he'd done nothing to ennoble art. He wanted to destroy his work-the Pieta! And this from the greatest artist who ever lived. Of course I am not comparing my work to Michelangelo's. But this eternal dissatisfaction of the artist is what I was talking about.

  John Huston

  Art, Talking, Done

  26 Copy quote

• Talk to them about things they don't know. Try to give them an inferiority complex. If the actress is beautiful, screw her. If she isn't, present her with a valuable painting she will not understand. If they insist on being boring, kick their asses or twist their noses. And that's about all there is to it.

  John Huston

  Beautiful, Giving, Trying

  26 Copy quote

• Critics have never been able to discover a unifying theme in my films. For thatmatter, neither have I.

  John Huston

  Able, Film, Theme

  John Huston, Robert Emmet Long (2001). “John Huston: Interviews”, p.43, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  17 Copy quote

• What you try to become is a bringer of magic, for magic and the truth are closely allied and movies are sheer magic ... when they work, it's, well, it's glorious.

  John Huston

  Magic, Trying, Film

  15 Copy quote

• Once you have found the right shot to introduce the scene-written your first declarative sentence-then the rest flows. You've found the key to the whole scene.

  John Huston

  Keys, Flow, Firsts

  22 Copy quote

• She went right down into her own personal experience for everything, reached down and pulled something out of herself that was unique and extraordinary. She had no techniques. It was all the truth, it was only Marilyn. But it was Marilyn, plus. She found things, found things about womankind in herself.

  John Huston

  Unique, Technique, Down And

  15 Copy quote

• I don't approve of censorship. I like the French theatre idea. Put on the play, and if the audience doesn't care for it, or feels offended by it, they rip up the seats.

  John Huston

  Rip, Play, Ideas

  14 Copy quote

• Each picture with its particular environment and unique personal relationships is a world unto itself - separate and distinct. Picture makers lead dozens of lives - a life for each picture. And, by the same token, they perish a little when each picture is finished and that world comes to an end. In this respect it is a melancholy occupation.

  John Huston

  Unique, World, Occupation

  15 Copy quote

• I would spend more time with my children. I would make my money before spending it. I would learn the joys of wine instead of hard liquor. I would not smoke cigarettes when I had pneumonia. I would not marry a fifth time.

  John Huston

  Children, Wine, Pneumonia

  13 Copy quote

• Marilyn was one step from oblivion when I directed her in The Asphalt Jungle. I remember she impressed me more off the screen than on…there was something touching and appealing about her.

  John Huston

  Touching, Steps, Remember

  12 Copy quote

• There is a wilful lemming-like persistance in remaking past successes time after time. They can't make them as good as they are in our memories, but they go on doing them and each time it's a disaster. Why don't we remake some of our bad pictures - I'd love another shot at 'Roots of Heaven' - and make them good?

  John Huston

  Memories, Past, Roots

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• For sheer strength of character, I wouldn't have dared to cross swords with Callas. I would rather have gone six rounds with Jack Dempsey.

  John Huston

  Character, Gone, Six

  John Huston, Robert Emmet Long (2001). “John Huston: Interviews”, p.168, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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