One man writes a novel. One man writes a symphony. It is essential that one man make a film.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of diverse artistic expressions, specifically highlighting the necessity of filmmaking alongside literature and music.
In this quote, Stanley Kubrick illustrates the significance of film as a vital form of art that complements and stands alongside other creative disciplines such as novel writing and symphonic composition. He suggests that just as literature and music have their own unique contributions to culture and human experience, film is an essential medium that offers its own unique insights and storytelling capabilities that should not be overlooked or undervalued.
In practice
In a discussion about the significance of different art forms, this quote can highlight the necessity of filmmaking.
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.
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.
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.
I realized at a young age that sequence in an album is almost as important as the songs that are on the album.
I've always believed in writing without a collaborator, because where two people are writing the same book, each believes he gets all the worry and only half the royalties.
I see myself first and foremost as a student of expression.
Of the thousands of people, celebrated and unknown, who have sat before my camera, I am often asked who was the most difficult subject, or the easiest, or which picture is my favorite. This last question is like asking a mother which child she likes the most
I always say that music is a small drop in the ocean of life. I was told a long time ago that your horn, or whatever instrument you play, is a means to be in the world.
My life, my reading, everything about me revolves around the cinema. So for me, cinema is life, and vice-versa.
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