Some quotes from an interview Stanley Kubrick gave about the film Barry Lyndon [via CP]...
There is an aspect of film-making which can be compared to a sporting contest. You can start with a game plan but depending on where the ball bounces and where the other side happens to be, opportunities and problems arise which can only be effectively dealt with at that very moment.
[On the topic of period costuming] What is very important is to get some actual clothes of the period to learn how they were originally made. To get them to look right, you really have to make them the same way.
(That’s a Christopher Alexander theme too…you can’t make “the same thing” with a different process.)
I think Nabokov may have had the right approach to interviews. He would only agree to write down the answers and then send them on to the interviewer who would then write the questions.
...and here’s a couple more interesting quotes from thinkexist.com’s Kubrick quotes page.
If you can talk brilliantly about a problem, it can create the consoling illusion that it has been mastered.
Perhaps it sounds ridiculous but the best thing that young filmmakers should do is to get hold of a camera and some film and make a movie of any kind at all.
Related: All of Coudal’s posts on Stanley Kubrick (“A look back through our archives reveals an obsession with the work of Stanley Kubrick…”)
Coudal
on 15 Feb 07Thanks Matt. While you’re checking through our Kubrick archives you might notice that there’s a dead link to SK’s 1969 screenplay for the unmade “Napoleon.” It’s really an amazing document, and maybe if you ask nicely….
Su
on 15 Feb 07The Nabokov quote is a complete fabrication. (The details of it; whether the quote itself happened I can’t say.) He required that questions be submitted to him, and he would provide written answers that would have to be reproduced verbatim. He usually got draft approval on top of it, to make any final corrections or additions to his responses and also make sure the interview didn’t try to sneak anything in.
njivy
on 16 Feb 07Matt, you must be flattered that Kubrick would quote you!
(That was my first impression when reading the title of this post, an unfortunate juxtaposition that resulted in a multi-colored sentence with no truth. Oops!)
Regarding the fourth quote about problems and their mastery, we hope that observers follow through on their convictions. “Faith without works is dead,” someone once said. Otherwise the brilliant talker is just that.
95105
on 19 Feb 07Matt, you must be flattered that Kubrick would quote you!
(That was my first impression when reading the title of this post, an unfortunate juxtaposition that resulted in a multi-colored sentence with no truth. Oops!)
Regarding the fourth quote about problems and their mastery, we hope that observers follow through on their convictions. “Faith without works is dead,” someone once said. Otherwise the brilliant talker is just that.
This discussion is closed.