Jonathan Demme
Jonathan Demme
Robert Jonathan Demmeis an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Demme rose to prominence in the 1980s with his comedy films Melvin and Howard, Swing Shift, Something Wildand Married to the Mob. He became best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Director. He later directed the acclaimed films Philadelphiaand Rachel Getting Married...
documentaries fiction film
I love doing fiction. I love doing performance films and I love doing documentaries that don't have music. I love to shoot and I love to shoot things I'm enthusiastic about.
scripts stories pages
When you're working on a script, every word that's on the page, somebody has to read it. Make every word count in your stories.
cutting long trying
I like finding a great shot and then just staying with it for a long time, not trying to pump things up with some kind of artificial energy by cutting.
athlete people challenges
Extraordinary people are the Green Berets and the Navy Seals and the Olympic athletes - these are the ones who can face these extraordinary physical challenges and be triumphant.
mean littles documentaries
Everything I've made - it doesn't mean they've all been good - but everything I've made so far, big or little, fiction or documentary, has been something that I've been really enthusiastic about.
vocabulary people singing
If you're doing a music film, you've got to be singing about something. Or, you have to be singing in a vocabulary that has tremendous appeal or else people are not going to want to sit there for eighty or ninety minutes hearing this stuff.
beats performances live-performance
Nothing beats a live performance. Nothing.
three-things abstract trilogies
A trilogy is a pretty abstract notion. You can apply it to almost any three things.
kids littles love-making
As a kid, a little kid, I loved going to the movies, and now I love making movies.
independent games originality
I've never had a good game plan. At a certain point, making independent films became more and more appealing to me because I like freshness and originality.
unique looks film
Every film deserves its own unique look.
song years white
I'm of Neil Young's generation. Neil Young's songs have spoken to what it's like to be at least a white male of his generation over the years. Endlessly, he's sung about the stuff that I really care about. He's put into words the feelings that hit you at different transitional moments in life.
becoming-one acting cinema
I felt from time to time that shooting live music is the most purely cinematic thing you can do. Ideally, the cinema is becoming one with the music. There is little artifice involved. There's no acting. I love it.
responsibility character actors
I only work with actors who take full responsibility for their characters.