I've never achieved spectacular success with a film. My reputation has grown slowly. I suppose you could say that I'm a successful filmmaker-in that a number of people speak well of me. But none of my films have received unanimously positive reviews, and none have done blockbuster business.
Interpretation
Success can be defined in numerous ways, and public perception may not always align with commercial achievements.
This quote by Stanley Kubrick reflects on the subjective nature of success in filmmaking. While he acknowledges that he has not achieved blockbuster hits or universal acclaim, he finds value in the respect and positive regard he has earned over time, indicating that success can also be measured by the lasting impact one has on their audience and peers rather than just commercial success or critical accolades.
In practice
In a speech addressing graduating students about the nature of success.
The reality of the final moment, just before shooting [the scene], is so powerful that all previous analysis must yield before the impressions you receive under these circumstances, and unless you use this feedback to your positive advantage, unless you adjust to it, adapt to it and accept the sometimes terrifying weaknesses it can expose, you can never realize the most out of your film.
Because I direct films, I have to live in a major English-speaking production center. That narrows it down to three places: Los Angeles, New York and London. I like New York, but it's inferior to London as a production center. Hollywood is best, but I don't like living there.
A film is - or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme, what's behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later.
The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes.
Anyone who has ever been privileged to direct a film also knows that, although it can be like trying to write 'War and Peace' in a bumper car in an amusement park, when you finally get it right, there are not many joys in life that can equal the feeling.
The essence of dramatic form is to let an idea come over people without it being plainly stated. When you say something directly, it's simply not as potent as it is when you allow people to discover it for themselves.
Luck? Sure. But only after long practice and only with the ability to think under pressure.
No one knows what to say in the loser's locker room.
Often the difference between a successful person and a failure is not one has better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on one's ideas, to take a calculated risk - and to act.
Anyplace we go in the world, when someone asks us what we do, we feel an immense pride in saying, 'FBI.'
Only he who attempts the absurd is capable of achieving the impossible.
Just remember, you can't climb the ladder of success with your hands in your pockets.
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