Richard Donner Quotes

A great movie evolves when everybody has the same vision in their heads.

Films are not mathematics - that's the first thing you need to understand. At least, that's how I feel. They are not words on paper. Films are made with people, with teams and with individual bundles of creativity coming together to fulfill the vision of an individual who is the director of the film.

When I sign on for a project, I'm there to give the director all the material he or she might need to tell their story, and that's the number one priority.

All these directors, and I would include the Coen brothers and Quentin, have a very unique vision of what they want. They listen to ideas and make people feel like everyone is making the film.

Any story, any screenplay can only happen if the whole unit is professionally working towards it.

If I'm talking to a photographer, I'm talking to a stylist, I'm talking to a makeup artist, we're kind of creating and collaborating and making something that is artwork and is special and is different.

Frank Miller is more of a visionary than any director I've ever worked with, and he achieves that vision better than anyone I've ever worked with.

And 'Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll' was a very transitional film for me in that I was one of the producers and you know, came up with the idea with the writer and the producer, as well. But, it was a very collaborative event. You know, I really love working in that way.

And I think one way or another it's evident to those who work with me that as a writer, a director, a friend, as somebody's there that's very anxious to get the movie made.

Obviously in Art of Noise, I'm just part of the group, and when I do film scores, it's always in collaboration with the director and other people involved.

I just love working with actors, and I love working with writers, working with designers. I feel that I am just a storyteller, and whether I am wearing the director hat or the playwright hat, it doesn't matter. And the rooms I tend to be in are pretty democratic, and the best idea wins.

I have worked with several art directors and production designers who are just magnificent. Dave Getz, Paul Felix, Ian Gooding... just amazing artists, and I would say, if I had anything to do with it, I just pick good artists!

Filmmaking is such a collaborative piece of art that you can't look to one person - you couldn't look to me, you couldn't say, 'Because Vin's in it, it's this or that...' It's really all of us coming together for that period of time to try and make magic.

When the director has a vision for a piece that I've never heard before, and they can back that up with visuals, and they talk a good game, I get really interested in the world that they're trying to create.

I think one of the geniuses of Bound and The Matrix and Memento is the complete collaboration of the effort. There were no rotten apples.

What goes on between the actor and director is sacred.

Necessarily, I'm always involved in casting, as any playwright is, because the whole process of putting on a play is a collaborative, organic effort on the part of a bunch of people trying to think alike.

Movies are the work of a collective conscious. It takes 500-800 people on a movie to complete a vision.

It's amazing to be able to work with people right at the top of whatever they do... inspiring photographers and stylists with very interesting visual language. The more I do it, the more I enjoy it.

I'd work with Danny Boyle every day of the week. No matter what he was doing I would do that.

The thing I really love about film is there's a really big sense of teamwork, and everyone has to do their job to the best of their ability to make the film work in the first place.

Filmmaking is such a collaborative medium.

The great thing about movies is that they're collaborative. And the worst thing is that they're collaborative.

I believe everything creative is somewhat collaborative. If you're a painter and someone stretches your canvas, it was collaborative on some level.

My approach to working in movies is to empower the director to have power over me and to really support his vision because he's the guy, at the end of the day, who's going to put it all together.