Gilliam Quotes & Sayings

All films are learning processes. I am still trying to work out how you make a movie. I didn't study at film school or any of those things. I didn't bother with film theory. — Terry Gilliam

Working with Terry Gilliam was magic - I've been watching his films since I was little. — Paloma Faith

Fantasy isn't just a jolly escape: It's an escape, but into something far more extreme than reality, or normality. It's where things are more beautiful and more wondrous and more terrifying. You move into a world of conflicting extremes. — Terry Gilliam

The internet illuminates what has always been -- our interconnectedness. The internet is not a tool or a thing. It is how we communicate with God. It is sacred. Holy. All that time I thought I'd been far from God I wasn't. I'd been talking to God everyday for years -- online. The internet saved me from the hell of Christian fundamentalism and the despair of atheism. And then it saved my life. — Jim Gilliam

The whole point of animation to me is to tell a story, make a joke, express an idea. The technique itself doesn't really matter. Whatever works is the thing to use. — Terry Gilliam

As much as I loved Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Junior Gilliam, and Don Newcombe, I loved watching Willie Mays play more than all of them combined, even if he played for the 'bad guys!' — Cheech Marin

I'm a cartoonist, it's what I am at heart, so cartoons take reality and deform it and make it grotesque, you make it funny, but you alter it. If it works, it's based on reality. That's what I try to do. — Terry Gilliam

Gorillaz virtually changed my wife ... sorry, I mean, life ... no, actually, it was my wife. — Terry Gilliam

I've always had a fondness for that satirical, Terry Gilliam - esque evil corporate megastructure, the kind of business that hangs banners that say making your life better as it throws kittens into the gears. — Chris Hardwick

These may or may not be used in your actual novels, but it will give you a sense of relationships and help you establish the habits needed to write on a regular basis. — Patricia Gilliam

There are moments when television systems are young and haven't formed properly, and there's room for lots of original stuff. Then things become more and more top-heavy with executives who are trying to guarantee the success of things. — Terry Gilliam

I'm trying to escape by forming my own kind of world. Basically, I'm trying to encourage others to do the same. — Terry Gilliam

Nobody went to see Tideland! I was hoping people would get angry about it but those that saw it didn't want to talk about it. This is the world we're living in, people don't want to discuss things that are actually worth discussing. — Terry Gilliam

They make Spy Kids, they make Scream, they make A Scary Movie. This doesn't do that, so it could be a very bad marriage. I'm trying to keep this potential nightmare quiet because we're just finishing editing. — Terry Gilliam

I have always got medicine I want to give to people. — Terry Gilliam

The success of the Hollywood marketing machine is to limit what we see. Not just to limit what we can see, but also to limit our expectations - to limit what we want to see. — Terry Gilliam

I never define depression, clinical or otherwise. It's the basis of most life, it seems to me, in the modern world. We're all depressed. — Terry Gilliam

We suffered for our art. You have to suffer for our art as well! — Terry Gilliam

Help! Help! I'm being repressed! — Terry Gilliam

I think it's worse for actors, though, because people have to choose you. As a director, I get to choose the actors, but most of the time, actors have to be chosen in order to work. — Terry Gilliam

It's 85 million dollars and they got to be really careful because they are going to need me. — Terry Gilliam

If you really want your films to say something that you hope is unique, then patience and stamina, thick skin and a kind of stupidity, a mule-like stupidity, is what you really need. — Terry Gilliam

Talent is less important in filmmaking than patience. — Terry Gilliam

Reality and fantasy, we need both of those to survive. If we don't have fantasy, dreams and all of those things, what's the point of carrying on? And you need to watch out for reality because buses come. — Terry Gilliam

You know the hardest thing to do in Hollywood is burn bridges. There is usually some sucker who still likes me. There is usually some sucker who will still work with me. — Terry Gilliam

I think that's the problem with kids now. Everything is manufactured. And then they're sitting there watching the television, where all the work is done for them. Radio made me use my imagination. — Terry Gilliam

At the first screening, there were a lot of areas that we went around and around about. Then we had our second screening. It played better. It's almost a reasonable length film now! — Terry Gilliam

If God is humanity connected, then the internet is God incarnate; a manifestation of our connection, a rudimentary form of hyperconnected humanity. — Jim Gilliam

Getting the role in '300' saved me. I'd been out of work for 11 months after 'The Brothers Grimm.' Once the film came out and didn't do so well, the director Terry Gilliam blamed me for absolutely everything. It was pretty appalling, and I had started to wonder if I'd ever get another job again when I was asked to audition for '300.' — Lena Headey

I thought, how do you confuse violent Russian mobsters? Well, by being silly! — Terry Gilliam

Because she should be sure in her soul that the most terrifying thing in the forest was her — Terry Gilliam

There's something about living in the country that I think makes you inventive, because nature is full of miracles and wonder and surprises, and if you don't have much money, you have to make things if you want things. — Terry Gilliam

I was born in 1940 in Minnesota and grew up in the country ... dirt roads, swamps, lakes, woods. — Terry Gilliam

Each one of us is a creator. And together, we are The Creator. — Jim Gilliam

Humanity connected is God. — Jim Gilliam

Terry Gilliam has spoken scathingly about my preference for physical comfort. I have come to the conclusion that this is very much his problem. — John Cleese

I got tired of my taxes paying for exciting little wars around the world. Then I discovered that when I died, my wife would probably have to sell our house to pay for the taxes in America. — Terry Gilliam

When it came to slaughtering sacred cows with such crude yet perfect musical precision, there was no one better than Frank. I wonder what songs he's teaching the angels right now? Good luck God! You've got your hands full this time. — Terry Gilliam

My heroes are guys like Frank Capra and Elia Kazan and Coen brothers and Terry Gilliam, more so than a lot of bass players at this point in my life. So I've always been an old-film nut and have very much enjoyed doing videos over the years. — Les Claypool

Cameron, Gilliam, Jackson, Fincher, Kubrick, Lucas, Spielberg, Del Toro, Tarantino. And, of course, Kevin Smith. — Ernest Cline

[Steven Spielberg's films] are comforting, they always give you answers and I don't think they're very clever answers ... The success of most Hollywood films these days is down to fact that they're comforting. They tie things up in nice little bows and give you answers, even if the answers are stupid, you go home and you don't have to think about it ... The great filmmakers make you go home and think about it. — Terry Gilliam

I think there's a side of me that's trying to compete with Lucas and Spielberg - I don't usually admit this publicly - because I tend to think that they only go so far, and their view of the world is rather simplistic. What I want to do is take whatever cinema is considered normal or successful at a particular time and play around with it - to use it as a way of luring audiences in. — Terry Gilliam

In advertising, I was frustrated by having to deal with the client. It was the only time I really worked in a proper office, and I didn't like it-simple as that. — Terry Gilliam

The forces that run the world always try to keep things under control. The population might be having a wonderful time, buying iPods and going to nice restaurants, but I still feel they're all kind of under control. — Terry Gilliam

Now, anybody can make a movie, and I don't see that many great movies, because I think there's only a limited amount of talent out there. — Terry Gilliam

I wasn't creative or theatrical. I was just doing everything. I was head cheerleader, valedictorian - it was ridiculous! — Terry Gilliam

It's interesting because a lot of people that stop me on the street now, and they talk about 'The Wire,' and they all have the same question: 'How come they took that show off the air?' — Seth Gilliam

Necessity might be the mother of invention, but restriction is the mother of efficiency. — Terry Gilliam

I shall be obliged if you will send Nora and the girls to church every Sunday for the next month to pray for the continued health and strength of the messrs. gilliam, reese, snider, campanella, robinson, hodges, furillo, podres, necombe and labine, collectively known as the The Brooklyn Dodgers. If they lose this World Series I shall Do Myself In and then where will you be? — Helene Hanff

I dream of working with iconic directors such as Tim Burton, Baz Luhrmann, Terry Gilliam and Wes Anderson - so I'm setting my sights pretty high! My perfect role would be in a fairy-tale period piece, and I'm quite upset all the Harry Potter movies have been made as I'd love to have been in those. — Dree Hemingway

Hyperbole is something I'd better avoid. — Terry Gilliam

I devoured each of what Halliday referred to as "The Holy Trilogies": Star Wars (original and prequel trilogies, in that order), Lord of the Rings, The Matrix, Mad Max, Back to the Future, and Indiana Jones. (Halliday once said that he preferred to pretend the other Indiana Jones films, from Kingdom of the Crystal Skull onward, didn't exist. I tended to agree.)
I also absorbed the complete filmographies of each of his favorite directors. Cameron, Gilliam, Jackson, Fincher, Kubrick, Lucas, Spielberg, Del Toro, Tarantino. And, of course, Kevin Smith.
I spent three months studying every John Hughes teen movie and memorizing all the key lines of dialogue. — Ernest Cline

I was getting frustrated with America. It's interesting how as simple a thing as, like, letting your hair grow longer changed in the world in those days. — Terry Gilliam

I got my head bashed in at a demonstration against the Vietnam War. Police were losing control because they were up against a world they really didn't understand. — Terry Gilliam

I'm overwhelmed by writers. Most people aren't impressed by writers, but if you can draw a cartoon or a picture, they think you're magic. — Terry Gilliam

People in Hollywood are not showmen, they're maintenance men, pandering to what they think their audiences want. — Terry Gilliam

The more money you have to work with, the more people you have to deal with that you probably don't want to be spending time dealing with. — Terry Gilliam

I was an incredible Anglophile. I found people who shared the same sense of humor and attitude toward the world. — Terry Gilliam

I was surprised at the level of commitment that Andrew Lincoln has. The extreme situations that he's asked to perform - that's got to be seriously draining, and he keeps going and going. He's almost not human. — Seth Gilliam

John Cleese was with a group called Cambridge Circus, who had come to New York, and we became friends. Years later that produced a certain team effort. — Terry Gilliam

I don't think you ever learn just one thing. At some point you start unlearning things. I have been working hard to unlearn everything I know. — Terry Gilliam

God is just what happens when humanity is connected. Humanity connected is god. Each one of us is a creator but, together, we are THE creator. — Jim Gilliam

You initially become funny as a kid because you're looking for attention and love. Psychologists think that's all to do with mother abandonment. I think John Cleese has his depressions, and Terry Gilliam's the same. All of us together make one completely insane person. — Eric Idle

We did Holy Grail, and I got my name up there as one of the directors. After that, I started moving more and more down the line I wanted to, which was making movies. — Terry Gilliam

It's hard for me to worry about the studios losing money. I'm not very sympathetic to their money problems, because they certainly haven't been sympathetic to mine. — Terry Gilliam

I keep referring to them in the plural but all I'm dealing with is Bob. I don't know where Harvey fits in the equation. He was very present at the beginning, winding his brother up. I don't know where he is now. — Terry Gilliam

I do want to say things in these films. I want audiences to come out with shards stuck in them. I don't care if people love my films or walk out, as long as they have a strong response. — Terry Gilliam

Port Talbot is a steel town, where everything is covered with gray iron ore dust. Even the beach is completely littered with dust, it's just black. The sun was setting, and it was quite beautiful. The contrast was extraordinary, I had this image of a guy sitting there on this dingy beach with a portable radio, tuning in these strange Latin escapist songs like 'Brazil.' The music transported him somehow and made his world less gray. — Terry Gilliam

'The Wire' is similar to 'The Walking Dead' in so far as everybody pulling for everybody else to get to the turning point of the story. — Seth Gilliam

The Brothers Grimm came along and I was so desperate for work ... Actually I've got to say that I like the movie, I won't apologize for it. — Terry Gilliam

There was a perverse side of me, with things like Van Helsing coming out. I didn't want to go down that route. — Terry Gilliam

Gilliam says of that time, 'I thought at least getting the Catholics, Protestants and Jews all protesting against our movie was fairly ecumenical on our part. We only missed out on the Muslims. And I thought that was pretty fantastic to see, marching in the streets with placards against Brian. We had achieved something useful. — Robert Sellers

I'm more prone to anarchy than I am to control - even though I'm a film director. — Terry Gilliam

I just like the fact I can make a film which might give comfort to some people who think they are the only crazy person in the world and suddenly they see there are two crazy people in the world. — Terry Gilliam

Because I dislike being quoted I lie almost constantly when talking about my work. — Terry Gilliam

Writers do the self-censoring before they even get to the studio executive, because they know the film will not run that gauntlet. They, because they want to get their films made, they censor it. — Terry Gilliam

It was lights, camera, inaction. — Terry Gilliam

You get trapped by stories. Though I've got this reputation for being out of control, it's not true, it just happens to be a more interesting story than the truth. — Terry Gilliam

My problem is I'm like a junkie. I want a good movie fix, and I never get that fix. — Terry Gilliam

Actually, I began to think that maybe there is a god, after all. Or maybe it's a different one. The old one got fired. — Terry Gilliam

For me, two of my favourite science fiction films are Blade Runner, which is fantastic, and Terry Gilliam's Twelve Monkeys. Both of those were smart science fiction films hitting more of a medium budget, and I desperately hope there is an audience for that kind of film because I would love that to be my next film, on that kind of scale. — Duncan Jones

Nooo! Leave that to George Lucas, he' s really mastered the CGI acting. That scares me! I hate it! Everybody is so pleased and excited by it. Animation is animation. Animation is great. But it's when you're now taking what should be films full of people, living thinking, breathing, flawed creatures and you're controlling every moment of that, it's just death to me. It's death to cinema, I can't watch those Star Wars films, they're dead things. — Terry Gilliam

The English are such a frightened, nervous, insecure group of people - they no longer rule the world! — Terry Gilliam

They all sort of get mixed up in my head, to be quite honest. They're all dealing with similar things. It's about how you deal with reality, by ignoring it sometimes, reinventing it other times, and that's how you get through it. — Terry Gilliam

It's been interesting how kids have had hardly any problems watching it, but adults have more trouble. This happened way back even with Jabberwocky and Time Bandits. — Terry Gilliam

I can feel my dreams but I can't remember them. — Terry Gilliam

I like the cinema of people like Terry Gilliam and Tim Burton. I am not keen on trying to reproduce reality - for that you should do documentaries. — Jean-Pierre Jeunet

Everybody gets excited about technology, but it doesn't interest me in the least. I'm only interested in it if it makes my job easier or cheaper. They're tools. — Terry Gilliam

I like being a patron of things, I like patronizing things. And if it's not going to be people, I'll patronize a festival. — Terry Gilliam

Once the voices are in your head, it's either make a movie or kill a lot of people. — Terry Gilliam

I was doing political cartoons and getting angry to the point where I felt I was going to have to start making and throwing bombs. I thought I was probably a better cartoonist than a bomb maker. — Terry Gilliam

Every few years when it's been another five years that have passed and I haven't made a film and the depression starts taking over totally, I allow myself to do a commercial. And then I feel really dirty and get to work promptly. — Terry Gilliam

They pay money to watch the same film. Now, you could argue, that's because it makes them feel comfortable. When they go to a movie now, it's almost like hearing a pop song. You know the rhythms, you know when the downbeat is going to come, you know when the explosion is going to come ... And so as life becomes more complex, as the economy is in trouble, people cling to what makes them comfortable, so they go again and again to see the same movie. — Terry Gilliam

Pryce, a veteran of Brazil and Baron Munchausen and a longtime Gilliam friend, bristles at the word chaos when applied to the Brothers Grimm set.] Terry knows what he wants, ... He's very demanding, but in a positive and generous way. And if you're up to it, it's very exciting. If you're not, you fall by the wayside. — Jonathan Pryce

Terry Gilliam is someone I'd always deeply admired. I saw his films when I was a child. — Gwendoline Christie

I don't have faith in the Internet, I have faith in people connected through the Internet. — Jim Gilliam

We took up the offer with the BBC, and that was Monty Python's Flying Circus. I didn't have to submit my ideas to the group. I used to turn up on the days we recorded with a can of film under my arm, and in it went. — Terry Gilliam

I hate losing laughs; they're rare things. — Terry Gilliam

The choice of roles as I grow older gets more and more limited, so if I pin myself to one kind of part I would get in trouble. So, these oddball ladies came along for me to do - I guess Terry Gilliam helped in this respect. I have found them more interesting, flashier and I get more mileage out of them. — Katherine Helmond

What I want to do is make films that astonish people, that astound people, and I hope you want to do that too. It's easy to make money. It's easy to make films like everybody else. But to make films that explode like grenades in people's heads and leave shrapnel for the rest of their lives is a very important thing. That's what the great filmmakers did for me. I've got images from Fellini, from Bergman, from Kurowsawa, from Bunuel, all stuck in my brain. — Terry Gilliam