Phrases

-Perhaps it is good to have a beautiful mind, but an even greater gift is to discover a beautiful heart.

-I want to make movies that pierce people’s hearts and touch them in some way, even if it’s just for the night while they’re in the cinema; in that moment, I want to bring actual tears to their eyes and goosebumps to their skin.

-God bless America, God Save the Queen, God defend New Zealand and thank Christ for Australia.

-A lot of the things that other people from outside the business would see as crazy or strange are just a natural part of the working process. Preparation is key, and detail and collaboration are the rule, but no matter how many hours you spend preparing, there’s always something.

-When I was a little kid, I used to really embarrass my parents.

-Imagine what you will be, and it will be so.

-We can’t repay our good luck with bad grace. It invites darkness.

-If you live like it’s the past and you behave like it’s the past, then guys from the future find it very hard to see you.

-The secret to riches is the same as the secret to comedy – timing.

-I have respect for beer.

-I respond in the moment which is what makes me a good actor.

-‘He’s the most charming man. He’s the Oscar Wilde of our time. I only had one moment with him in that film and it’s a great source of regret. I love spending time with him. He’s always very open and effusive. His interest in you is genuine.’

-People accuse me of being arrogant all the time. I’m not arrogant, I’m focused.

-The important thing to me is that I’m not driven by people’s praise and I’m not slowed down by people’s criticism. I’m just trying to work at the highest level I can.

-There’s nothing like sitting back and talking to your cows.

-I don’t make demands. I don’t tell you how it should be. I’ll give you options, and it’s up to you to select or throw ’em away. That should be the headline: If you’re insecure, don’t call.

-I’d move to Los Angeles if New Zealand and Australia were swallowed up by a tidal wave, if there was a bubonic plague in England and if the continent of Africa disappeared from some Martian attack.

-I like villains because there’s something so attractive about a committed person – they have a plan, an ideology, no matter how twisted. They’re motivated.

-I’m sick to death of famous people standing up and using their celebrity to promote a cause. If I see a particular need, I do try to help. But there’s a lot that can be achieved by putting a cheque in the right place and shutting up about it.

-You need to learn to live with your mistakes. And you need to be in a position to say No once in a while. It’s important in life, and it’s important for any career that you want to pursue.

-I love going shopping. I have a black belt in it.

-I have a new horse. I get her to come to me from half a mile away. With just a simple call. That’s because she knows that when she’s with me, she’s taken care of. She trusts me.

-In tyranny lies only failure. Empower every man and you will gain strength.

-Some people have got advice, some people have got horror stories. I like people that look you in the eye with a glow and say “It’s gonna be cool.”

-This is possibly the most shameful situation I’ve ever gotten myself in in my life, and I’ve done some pretty dumb things in my life. So to actually make a new No. 1 is spectacularly stupid.

-If you’re a certain type of actor, then eventually stepping into a director’s shoes is a natural transition. I’ve always been the actor who’s very focused on the narrative, where my character is in the story, and how I can benefit the story. I’ve always had a technical aspect of what the lens is, how the camera is going to move, how I can feed the information the director applies within that move. If you’re that type of actor, narrative-based, technically proficient, the next step is actually not that far.

-I’d like to play passionate women, but no one will let me.

-I hate having long hair. It’s like walking around with a dead koala on your back!

-In my life there were times when dreams have nothing to do with reality, but obviously they were prophetic dreams. And I know that if we look closely and listen carefully, we can see the supernatural signs that determine our future. We all meet with various everyday difficulties and overcoming them, we grow and develop.

-If you grow up … in the suburbs of anywhere, a dream like this seems kind of vaguely ludicrous and completely unattainable, this moment is directly connected to those childhood imaginings. And for anybody who’s on the downside of advantage, and relying purely on courage, it’s possible.

-I do occasionally wonder, if you were to bring to life one of those young men who sacrificed themselves in what was advertised to them as the Great War, and the war to end all war, and show them that we’re still engaged in armed conflict in the same area, I’m not sure that they would be pleased about what their sacrifices amounted to.

-I’m not one of those fellows that is just going to have a psuedo-middling relationship.

-I never looked at Noah as an animal collector. I always thought of him as an apocalyptic character. I read everything I found about it and was surprised to find that in all religions there is the story of the flood, and that one “hero” saved the world. This proved that Noah and his Ark – were not a religious myth, and is evidence that humanity really went through the flood.

-There has to be a mathematical explanation for how bad that tie is.

-Whenever I hear an American say Aussies drive on the ‘wrong side of the road,’ I just lose it. You ever think about how those people grew up driving on the ‘wrong side of the road,’ watched a lot of people get hurt on the ‘wrong side of the road,’ die on the ‘wrong side of the road,’ while other people cheered from the ‘right side of the road’? Australia has a thing called Highway Fights, so it’s touchy.

-I read the bible often, not just to prepare for “Noah”. I believe it is a very important book.

-I have to believe I got some kind of say over our lives.

-I don’t know if I was ever looking for this kind of success- it came along as a by-product of concentrating on what I was doing.

-When I was a young fellow, I used to learn the dialogue backwards. The point is that in a conversation between two people, you can’t have already made the decisions about what you’re gonna do. You gotta be very light on your feet. That leads you into areas where conversations can have a much bigger, grander meaning.

-Sport for me is about inspiring kids. Here’s the rules, here’s the play area, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. This is all about teaching kids how to approach life. If we’re not playing sport to benefit kids, I’m not really sure why we play sport.

-Some of the things you read you get an immediate reaction to so I’ve stopped reading things now. I do worry about my family though. Some people do try some nasty things to get at them and try and get a reaction from them.

-I really feel sorry for people who are, who divide their whole life up into ‘things that I like’ and ‘things that I must do.’ You’re only here for a short time, mate. Learn to like it.

-From an over-arching point-of-view, in war there is heroism on both sides. Obviously, the victor gets the spoils, the victor gets to write history, but there’s heroism and compassion on both sides, and to me that’s very important.

-Do I think Cate Blanchett is the most spectacular creature that ever walked the planet? Yes, I do.

-Brothers, what we do in life……..echoes in eternity.

-I don’t play chess with my life, ya’ know.

-When you’re heading into Anzac cove you are going into this battle situation staring into the sun. So, any movement in that water, any glint is going to be seen for miles away. Even in the first rays of dawn, there’s nowhere to hide.

-Australians and New Zealanders don’t talk about Gallipoli in terms of invasion. I started talking about it and using that word and at first there were a few people who were getting upset in the same way that in any country, if you work for a newspaper you know exactly the dude you can go and talk to get a knee-jerk reaction when it comes to something to do with the military.

-I always say I’ve given 24 insufficient performances and I’m looking forward to the time in my life when I’ll do something that I think is good. There’s always stuff you can do better, stuff that maybe you didn’t uncover enough. But if you do something that you truly believe is perfect, then that’s got to be the last movie you do.

-You can’t understand it until you experience the simple joy of the first time your son points at a seagull and says ‘Duck!’

-I am a man that has a lot of respect for faith and spirituality. I think it is important that we talk about religion in today’s world.

-If there’s anything about someone’s life that’s important enough to make a movie about it, I have to take responsibility to get all of it right. It’s a huge responsibility.

-My bottom line is that I think Ridley Scott is one of the greatest visual artists of our time and I feel very privileged that he wants to work with me, so I go with that flow.

-If I don’t get the goose-bump factor when I’m reading it than I can’t do it.

-On Sharon Stone (Quick and the Dead): ‘She was instrumental about me getting my first American job. Absolutely, without her support, it would not have happened. At the same time, however, was it really about me or her wanting to flex her producerial muscles? I don’t want to sound ungallant about the situation. But I didn’t find that in working with her, that we clicked on any other level.

-Even bad men love their mommas.

-Every building you come out of, there is a parasite there exercising his constitutional right to make money out of being a parasite, trying to take your photo. Frankly, folks, I go to work, I do my job. I really concentrate, and if you go to the cinema, pay your money and have a good time. That’s the end of it, as far as I’m concerned.

-My days, if they start in the morning with a cuddle from my son, are just so much more glorious than they were prior to that.

-To be honest, when you’re younger and cooler, you say those sort of things don’t mean anything, but then on the day when they pat you on the back and they say, “Look, mate, we’re noticing what you’re doing-thanks very much;’ you think of the people who spent a life in the cinema and didn’t receive that kind of accolade, and it’s sort of a humbling experience. And it’s very nice and all that. But it doesn’t change the way I do things.

-Once you’re a parent, male or female, every single thing that happens in your life is seen through the prism of being a parent.

-While I was trying to save money to go to the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Australia I ended up getting all of this experience which meant that by the time I had enough money in the bank to go to school I didn’t really need to go to school anymore.

-You don’t want to be starting a film not knowing what you want to do.

-Like everyone else, I’ve had moments when I’ve felt that I’ve been losing my grip.

-I can rely on me [being a director], unlike some actors. I never got anything less than what I needed from the lead actor.

-I’ve always found it to be a privilege to make movies. It’s a really expensive, creative medium. And people allow me to do it, and there are things that I can do as an actor that I couldn’t do in any other walk of life.

-My children have never watched any of my films. Charlie knows that daddy makes movies, but he says they are not good enough for him to watch.

-I think if there’s some kind of crisis in news journalism… a crisis of credibility, then it’s been created by journalists. I’m empathetic, I understand it and I see it, but I’m not sympathetic about it. If you want people to think of journalism with higher regard then do better work.

-Nobody wants zealotry in a police force, you know? You do want to know that the guy who’s got that badge, is confident enough to judge a certain level of benign corruption. Like a man steals some food to feed his starving children.

-I’m destined to be attracted to those I cannot defeat.

-I think that if there are problems in journalism they’re created by journalists… the trivialisation of the news and the sort of snyed, cynical allowance of untruth to be in a newspaper because it might be titillating.

-If you actually read the Bible, you can see there’s a whole lot more information in there than the way we interpret the Bible. Because there are single lines in the Bible where if you just take them at face-value, they don’t make any sense whatsoever in the world we see, we know, and we understand.

-Reality is, I’m an actor and an entertainer, and I really wouldn’t know what to do with another profession.

-If I’m creating the composition, it’s easier for me as an actor because I’ve just cut out the middle man. Because I’ve created the composition and now I’m in it, I already know exactly what I want to get out of it. So, bang!

-The thing about films is you learn new stuff all the time. You think you can get to a point where you’ve got it all down. But then another, different situation arises.

-It’s such an intimate experience, being a director, artistically. It’s deep and it’s satisfying and it’s wonderful, on so many levels, but it’s also really scary.

-Even though Noah is in the Koran as well. But we knew going into this project that you can’t make stories or render images about the Prophet. But I do believe people are missing out if they don’t have the choice to see this film.

-Iceland is fascinating; really an amazing place to visit, and great for a film to go there.

-Anyway, I’m doing my rave and this spittle comes out of my mouth and it winds its way very delicately through the wire fence that separates us and lands clear and bright on Denzel’s lip. And we’re at the beginning of the scene and I’ve got to do the rest of the scene, and the camera isn’t on him, it’s on me – and I’m fully aware that I’ve just spat on Denzel Washington!

-I never actually expected success, but it doesn’t surprise me when it comes because I know how much work I put into what I do.

-My definition [of genius] would be about being completely involved in your art form. So that’s outside of sciences. Within the arts it’s about taking people on a journey, being able to involve me completely-whether you’re singing a song, whether it’s in the theater, whether you’re dancing-if you can make me forget I’m sitting in a seat, that’s my definition of genius.

-Meg Ryan is a beautiful and courageous woman. I grieve the loss of her companionship, but I haven’t lost her friendship. We still phone each other for a good chat.

-Are you not entertained?