Film Festival Quotes & Sayings

When you go to a film festival as an audience member, it's so much fun. But when you bring your own film there, you carry so much stress and excitement. — Mora Stephens

When the fearsome foursome of rock music, Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Little Richard, and Jerry Lee Lewis, decided to show up in Toronto for a rock and roll festival, I knew we had to go there to try to get them all on film. — D. A. Pennebaker

The Singapore Media Festival brings together the most important Film and TV events in Singapore under one umbrella. With media convergence, I foresee that the SMF will encompass even more content formats in future, and will keep Singapore on the cutting-edge of media development. I am confident the SMF will be a signature media event for Singapore and the world for many years to come. — Calvin Cheng

So, where's the Cannes Film Festival being held this year? — Christina Aguilera

I've signed autographs as Natalie Portman. I was at a Film Festival party where someone asked if I was her, and I didn't want to embarrass them, so I signed the autograph as her. I hope she doesn't mind. — Liane Balaban

I love the Cannes Film Festival. From the lavish parties and events to the red carpet attire, this star-studded week-long event is where I get a lot of inspiration for hair and fashion. — Tabatha Coffey

Next time
we will roll out the red carpet for you in the United States of Arabia, my brethren! — Leonard Leventon

The biggest difference for me is that the tales really have no logical outlet, no particular infrastructure in which to present them as you would have with a film festival. There's no IMDb for audio dramas. So there's a lot of work with no particular reward. — Larry Fessenden

When I graduated from Brown after majoring in women's studies, I made my first PBS documentary, 'Women of Substance.' My first feature documentary was called 'American Hollow,' which I did for HBO and was at the Sundance Film Festival. — Rory Kennedy

The whole being-in-a-room interview thing, at a junket or a film festival, is very inhuman. You meet the person, have five or 10 minutes to talk, and it's not like a conversation. — Paul Dano

Whenever you take a subject you're obsessed with or that haunts you, and make a movie about it, you're converting it into work units that need to be completed. You gotta turn it into a treatment, a script, a grant application, a bunch of forms to be filled out, a shooting schedule, casting sessions, auditions, shooting, editing, music compositions, the film festival circuit, interviews even. And by the time you've finished the process you're so sick and tired by something that was once very precious to you that you're done with it. — Guy Maddin

The frustrating part of it is that you're generally known for what you did last. I've had the privilege of doing some very cool independent films that, a lot of the time, the general public doesn't see unless you're at a film festival or you're into that kind of movie. — Hayden Panettiere

If you go to a film festival and watch a bunch of features and then watch a bunch of shorts, you will almost always find that the shorts are where people are taking more risks and pushing more boundaries ... simply because they have much less to lose. — Don Hertzfeldt

documentary The Invisible War (which premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and — Nancy Sherman

Gentlemen. You are looking at the true Abraham Lincoln of Arabia. And in order to end our internal bickering - our civil war, if you will - I have solicited your aid. — Leonard Leventon

I think certain filmmakers going into Sundance or other big festivals should consider screening more for press and tastemakers before the festival. The traditional wisdom has always been the opposite: to not screen for anyone prior, let your film be seen by an audience, and generate the buzz from there. — Thom Powers

Each year we go to the Cannes film festival and I tend to have all my friends pile in the back of my car and we'll drive from London. The poor production company think they're only putting me up and suddenly they've got eight people sleeping on my hotel room floor. — Jeremy Irvine

As a director, or just a film fan who wants to enjoy the festival, Cannes is the worst place to be. But it must be a paradise for distributors and importers. — Bong Joon-ho

Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel first championed my film, 'Hoop Dreams,' which was essential to its success. Roger remained a great supporter of my work throughout my career, and I'll never forget him tweeting about 'The Interrupters' right before its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in 2011. — Steve James

I watch many, many, many independent films every year that you see once in a film festival and they're never heard of ever again. Many of them are very, very good. — Karen Allen

I have a second bedroom I don't use. I'm going to start the Second Bedroom Film Festival. You're all invited. — Vincent Schiavelli

I first visited the Toronto fest in 1979, its fourth edition, when it was known as the Festival of Festivals and had an audience of about 40,000. I happily returned to the 10-day skein nearly every year thereafter, as attendance swelled to 400,000 and it grew into the most influential film festival in North America, perhaps the world. — Richard Corliss

Toronto Film Festival is one of those festivals where there are 400 movies, and unless you have a distributor who is super confident and puts a lot of money into it, sometimes movies can go unwatched or unnoticed. — Viggo Mortensen

Listen, anybody who has a film festival has the right to show what they want. — Abel Ferrara

Full Frame is where I had the first showing of my first film, 'Street Fight.' I have a fond memory of pacing around outside the theater, nervously trying to keep from throwing up. It's a magical festival, well curated, with a warm and generous spirit. — Marshall Curry

I quite like that people tend not to know my name. I remember being at the Cannes film festival for 'All or Nothing.' I looked very different in the film - I had a little greasy bob and no makeup. I went to a dinner after the screening, and everyone completely ignored me. I got a real buzz out of that. — Lesley Manville

It's always really special to be at the New York Film Festival, and always a real privilege. — Noah Baumbach

Doing that, then doing a lot of theater, which I love. Doing guest stars, did two independent films that are going around to all these festivals. Both of them are going to be at the Lake Tahoe Film Festival. — Austin Peck

I had lived in Fukuoka during the mid 1990s, and I was a volunteer with the Fukuoka Asian Film Festival. — John Foster

When the war ended in 1945, Robert Newton's film career took off. And then he landed the part of Disney's Long John Silver. "What accent do you want me to put on?" he asked Walt, in his natural thick West-country, 'Cornwall/Devon/Dorset' burr. Pointing at his face excitedly, "Why, that one." Disney replied. And THE OFFICIAL PIRATE ACCENT was born. Newton went on to do another Long John Silver film, then a 26 part television series. He died early, aged 50, from chronic alcoholism, just the way a pirate would want to go. But he left the legacy of 'the' pirate accent 'til the end of time. Every pirate 'R' or 'Arrrgh' joke you ever heard, owes its very life to the combination of Robert Newton, R. L. Stevenson, and Walt Disney.
-- Renaissance Festival Survival Guide — Ian Hall

A definite highlight was doing 'The Brothers McMullen.' Shooting that movie was such a joy - and then we wound up winning the Sundance Film Festival. That big-break moment is visceral. It happens once in a decade, maybe once in a lifetime. — Connie Britton

If you get to bring a little movie on the festival circuit, it's a nice experience because you get to see it with an audience. People who go to festivals to watch films are usually a little more eager to enjoy them. It's exciting because it's like you're going to the film's opening night at every festival. — Dito Montiel

I took part in a theatre festival in Massachusetts two summers after I graduated from college. Then I was in Los Angeles thinking: "I'm going to go to New York." I'd decided that I would not have a chance of a film career, so I was about to make the move. I bought a plane ticket and found a place to live in New York, packed my bags and of course the universe "told me" that I was not meant to go. Suddenly, a week before I was supposed to leave, I had three job offers and one of them was my first movie. — Chris Pine

There's a lot of hyperventilation that takes off before the [Sundance Film] Festival, a lot of buzz. Every year we hear, this is going to be the new this, this is going to be the new that, and it never is. The buzz just doesn't mean anything. I'm glad it doesn't. Because I think the festival shows that what succeeds is content. — Robert Redford

In December of 2001, after September 11th, my wife, Jane Rosenthal, and Robert DeNiro asked me if I would help them create the Tribeca Film Festival. The idea was to revitalize lower Manhattan. We would show films on piers, in high schools. It was all about the community. We wanted it to be accessible to everybody. — Craig Hatkoff

People come to Cannes just to advertise their films, not with a particular message. But the advantage is that if you go to the festival, you get so much press coverage in three days that it advertises the film for the rest of the year. — Jean-Luc Godard

At the Hong Kong festival, we were co-producers of the opening film, 'Aberdeen,' which is the third part in a popular movie series. — Victor Koo

The Woodstock Film festival is among the finest of a dying breed: a festival that isn't trying to sell you anything, but simply and beautifully celebrating the art & craft of filmmaking. — Ethan Hawke

Some Promised Land. The honey was there, but the milk we brought in with our goats. To people in California, God gives a magnificent coastline, a movie industry, and Beverly Hills. To us He gives sand. To Cannes He gives a plush film festival. We get the PLO. Our winters are rainy, our summers hot. To people who didn't know how to wind a wristwatch He gives underground oceans of oil. To us He gives hernia, piles, and anti-Semitism. — Joseph Heller

I remember in 1968 when we were in Cannes, in the festival, and we were supposed to be there 10 days, and the second day the festival collapsed because the French, you know, film-makers raised the red flag in the festival and ended the festival. — Milos Forman

Going to see Godzilla at the Palais of the Cannes Film Festival is like attending a satanic ritual in St. Peter's Basilica. — Roger Ebert

On one occasion, Daniel Day-Lewis, Jeremy Irons and myself were due to appear at the Sarajevo film festival and were turned off a UN plane on orders from Geneva. We had to get local journalists to transport the films in for us. I tell you this only to demonstrate that festivals can be a lifeline. But, after all the difficulties I'd had in getting there, in 1996 I found myself being flown in on a four-seater RAF plane as an official guest, endorsed by the British Embassy. Ironically, the film I was to present was Mission: Impossible. — Vanessa Redgrave

For many years I enjoyed the pleasure of cruising on my yacht all summer long and these were my best holidays. In mid-May, we'd start in St Tropez. I'd collect my bikinis from my home there and then we'd go up to Cannes for the Film Festival, on to Monte Carlo for the Grand Prix and then to Italy. — Ivana Trump

Anyone for a Film Festival?: — Jerome Pitt

Our film [Hide and seek ]was created as part of the Asian American Film Lab's 11th 72 Hour Film Shootout filmmaking competition, where filmmaking teams have just 72 hours to conceive, write, shoot, edit and submit a film based on a common theme. The winners were announced during the 38th Asian American International Film Festival in New York last July. The theme for 2015 was 'Two Faces' and was part of a larger more general theme of 'Beauty'. — Garth Kravits

Can I just tell you the truth? I get asked to do a lot of stuff. And all of the years that people have asked me to do things for the film festival, I couldn't. And so this year, I thought, "Oh, my god, I don't have a day job. If somebody ask me to do something, I'm going to do it." — Oprah Winfrey

Jewish people, we're repulsed by Hitler, but we're obsessed with him. If you ever want to rob a Jewish person's house, all you have to do is call them up and tell them there's a Hitler film festival down at the multiplex - watch them file out. — Andy Kindler

Vincent Gallo has put a curse on my colon and a hex on my prostate. He called me a 'fat pig' in the New York Post and told the New York Observer I have 'the physique of a slave-trader.' He is angry at me because I said his 'The Brown Bunny' was the worst movie in the history of the Cannes Film Festival ...
it is true that I am fat, but one day I will be thin, and he will still be the director of 'The Brown Bunny.' — Roger Ebert

You can do a short film in three to four days, and then you can show it. Look at the careers you seen go either through Tropfest or outside of Tropfest. You can make a short film in a couple of days, and if it's great, it can go in the Internet or go to a film festival like this one or another. — John Polson

I got nominated for my second film as best young director in the Aikido Film Festival in Japan. — Donnie Yen

Sadly most films only get exposure if they win an award or were in a festival, which is really difficult because those things cost money! Submitting your film to a festival or campaigning for an Oscar or a Golden Globe is very expensive. Most people don't know that, but all those events require a lot of money. If you have a small independent film, it's very hard to get the attention of people in those circles. — Kate Del Castillo

It took Cianfrance 12 years to bring 'Blue Valentine' to the screen after he first conceived it. He found Gosling and Williams early on, and they hung in there with him. The film finally premiered at Sundance 2010, then screened at Cannes and the Toronto Film Festival before landing in theaters in December. — Katie Hafner

Every year there's a jury at the Cannes Film Festival. Getting on the jury is very competitive in France. Not because the French love cinema, but because they love to judge. — Craig Ferguson

I like the Edinburgh Film Festival, and I've liked what I've experienced of Glasgow's Film Festival too. — Aidan Gillen

Now I'm doing a film festival for kids and writing a script about a kidnapped journalist in Afghanistan. — Olivia Wilde

We have a documentary film festival in Mexico. It's really original. It's called Ambulante, and it's a film festival that travels around several cities in Mexico. — Gael Garcia Bernal

The film festival measured a mile in length, from the Martinez to the Vieux Port, where sales executives tucked into their platters of fruits de mer, but was only fifty yards deep. For a fortnight the Croisette and its grand hotels willingly became a facade, the largest stage set in the world. Without realizing it, the crowds under the palm trees were extras recruited to play their traditional roles. As they cheered and hooted, they were far more confident than the film actors on display, who seemed ill at ease when they stepped from their limos, like celebrity criminals ferried to a mass trial by jury at the Palais, a full-scale cultural Nuremberg furnished with film clips of the atrocities they had helped to commit. — J.G. Ballard

New York is the perfect place for a film festival because there's already so much energy and life here, and New Yorkers love movies. — Clark Gregg

This January, Kevin Costner will be honored by the Palm Springs International Film Festival for his contribution to film. This gives Costner just two months to make a contribution to film. — Tina Fey

I have an Italian comedy at the Venice Film Festival. — Robert Englund

I remember when I was like 19 years old and I started a desk calendar company to pay for my first short film, just so I could say one day that my daddy didn't pay for my first short film. And I really established myself in the film festival world. — Jason Reitman

My dad made a film called 'Willow' when he was a young filmmaker, which screened at the Cannes film festival, and people were booing afterwards. — Bryce Dallas Howard

I don't really expect much from my life. So when I heard my films are premiering in film festival circuits I was glad of course but I thought it was lucky accident. — Takeshi Kitano

January 26: Marilyn is invited to attend the Foreign Press Association's First Annual International Film Festival at the Club Del Mar in Santa Monica and creates a sensation by wearing an Idaho potato burlap bag designed for her by Billy Travilla. — Carl Rollyson

In starting to learn about film festivals and what were good ones - 'cause there are five billion of them - it was just a really good East Coast festival. And I thought this little movie was an East Coast film. — Andrew McCarthy

The very first thing I saw at this year's Telluride Film Festival was sheer bliss. "Lava," a musical romance from Pixar Animation, was one of the shorts that traditionally precede almost every festival screening; the director was James Ford Murphy. The story, spanning millions of years in 7 minutes, starts with a lonely Hawaiian volcano who, crooning to ukulele accompaniment, yearns for "someone to lava. — Anonymous

I think, often with Australian films, if an Australian film has been given the seal of approval by an offshore festival or an offshore release, then it does mean a lot to a local audience. — Joel Edgerton

When the film [Certified Copy] was in the Cannes Festival, I realized that the fact of having it shot in a different culture, in a different language, in a different setting, that wasn't mine and that I didn't belong to, gave me a totally different relationship to the film. When I was sitting in the audience during the official screening in Cannes, I didn't feel that it was my film. — Abbas Kiarostami

To be able to work with people who I have respected and admired, to be a part of something like the Cannes Film Festival, is surreal and brilliant. — Luke Evans

When my film went to the Venice Film Festival and won the best script writing, the jury [prize], it didn't go to my head. I know how many black filmmakers that I am operating with whose name will never be mentioned. But I'm part of them in that silent existence. — Haile Gerima

I'll never forget the first screening at the Berlin Film Festival. As soon as the film ended there was an outbreak of booing, which made us look at each other with some surprise. — John Schlesinger

When I show a film at a festival, I am showing myself. Everything is at stake for me. — Lars Von Trier

I actually know the moment I became known. It was at the Cannes Film Festival, when they showed 'The Virgin Spring.' I walked into that theater as one person, and I walked out as another. — Max Von Sydow

Well I was on the jury duty on the Deauville Film Festival, a few years ago. — Liam Neeson

I went to the Tokyo Film Festival in Japan because I love Japanese cinema. — Leslie Caron

I went to Poland for the Warsaw Film Festival, and it was quite an intense experience. I didn't think it would be, but it did feel quite emotional to go back to this place I'd heard so much about. — Lenny Abrahamson

The Cannes film festival is about big-budget films but also remarkable films made in different political regimes by film-makers with little resources. — Kristin Scott Thomas

I always go to the Cannes Film Festival and it's just such a glamorous time. — Georgina Chapman

In an old model, the way a film would imprint itself on the public's consciousness is to get a theatrical run. But now there are more documentaries and more films in general being released than ever before. There are weeks when the New York Times is reviewing 15 films, so it's harder to leave an impression on the public. A lot of these films are seeing their financial future on digital platforms. Because viewers aren't hearing as much about films in theatrical release, I think the festival circuit is going to have increasing importance for the life of a film. — Thom Powers

You can't host an Italian film festival without Marcello Mastroianni. It just doesn't feel right. — Gia Coppola

Tribeca Film Festival Doha will promote Middle Eastern themes and filmmakers, but not exclusively. Approximately 40 films will be presented at the new Museum of Islamic Art and in cinemas across Doha. Innovative work by established filmmakers will be shown alongside the debuts of newly discovered directing talents. — Craig Hatkoff

I did a short film called 'Disco' and won an award for Best Supporting Actor at an indie film festival, and that was nice. Hopefully there's lots more to come. — Charlie Rowe

When I met Bono at the Cannes Film festival while I was there for the film 'United 93,' he said to me, 'That's a great film, brother. Thank you for your courage in making it.' I plotzed. — David Alan Basche

I did do some Shakespeare on film, it's really difficult. It's really interesting, because I was doing a series in Canada called 'Slings and Arrows' and it was about a company based around the Stratford Festival. — Rachel McAdams

What's great about the Sundance Film Festival is the festival takes over that town as it's intended to do. But, it's very focused on a lot of other filmmakers and distributors so it almost feels like, while they're a lot of so-called civilians there, it's an opportunity that you have to see, to show your stuff to the other folks, your peers really, and to get that reaction. — Alex Gibney

I love dressing up, but I do find the red carpet thing quite stressful. When I went to Venice Film Festival last month to promote 'Wuthering Heights,' I told my boyfriend beforehand 'I will be a nightmare, I will cry, I will be nervous.' Actually once I was there, it was fine. — Kaya Scodelario

TORONTO
When Cameron Crowe was flying to the Toronto film festival recently, he walked down the aisle of the plane and studied his fellow passengers sitting in front of their personal TV sets. They were just having the greatest time, there was so much joy in their eyes, .. And I looked to see what they were watching. And it was all out-and-out comedies. So many people watching The Longest Yard. And I just got the feeling that, 'You know what? People just like to let it all go, and have a laugh'. — Cameron Crowe

There is a little bit of everybody in everybody. — Leonard Leventon

Tribeca Film Festival Doha will be both an industry festival and an audience festival, not just an event for insiders. Community outreach will be a major part of what we're doing. We'll put filmmakers in touch with local, regional, and international audiences. — Craig Hatkoff

The really cool thing is all about being able to take your movie around and show it. It puts you in direct contact with people who are like-minded and interested in similar things. I think the film festival circuit has certainly helped to foster the community. — Joe Swanberg

The first rule of all filmmaking is that every scene should start at the last possible moment and end at the first possible moment. — Austin Film Festival

I play the guitar. This year at the Sundance film festival, I joined the band from 'The Guitar' on stage. We warmed up for Patti Smith, and then the director Michel Gondry got on the drums to play some songs from the soundtrack to his film Be Kind Rewind with Mos Def. It was pretty mad. — Saffron Burrows

Telluride has an incredible history and reputation, and I've long known of it as a unique entity that makes a place for writers - one more aspect of this exceptional film festival in the Colorado Alps. — Rachel Kushner

I was being taken around by a press agent at the Venice Film Festival at age 18. Was it fun? Sure. But it was a dangerous path to be walking on as far as having a substantive life. Because the casualty rate at the Venice Film Festival for 18-year-olds? High. — Ethan Hawke

The Ordinary is Extraordinary ..." my motto for life as a writer/Mom/woman — Lisa Barr

Well I'm Superman, just not action. I'm kind of looking for something with a lot less action and more talking and listening. I also have a film that's premiering Vegas Film Festival, short film, directed by Joel Kelly, it's called Denial and it's a story, short film, 35 mm short film and it's about a man's struggle to choose between the woman of his dreams and his reality, so it's definitely different than Superman. So I'm really proud of that. — Brandon Routh

There has never been a female director who has won an Oscar. There has only been one woman who won at the Cannes Film Festival. — Salma Hayek

It's a very strange experience to watch yourself in a movie anyway. I most frequently don't do it, but if I was going to do it, I would do it in a private way, not at a public screening at a film festival, which is just an overwhelming experience. — Jesse Eisenberg