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French people are strange about America, I think.

Michel Hazanavicius

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Michel Hazanavicius
Age: 57
Born: 1967
Born: March 29
Actor
Film Director
Film Editor
Film Producer
Screenwriter
Paris
France
Michel Hazanavičius
Think
Thinking
People
French
Strange
America

More quotes by Michel Hazanavicius

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Actually, I met a lot of directors and most of them have that fantasy to make a silent movie because for directors it's the purest way to tell a story. It's about creating images that tell a story and you don't need dialogue for that.
Michel Hazanavicius
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An idea is something you work on to make it work and a desire is much deeper in a way.
Michel Hazanavicius
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When you're with your wife, you don't say I love you to your wife every day but the ways you look at her and your actions are another way to communicate. Don't focus on dialogue, only focus on what you're expressing.
Michel Hazanavicius
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Sometimes I think you have to try to do things that people don't think are doable. I remember at the very beginning actually, the first person I had to convince was myself really because there's a self-censorship. When everybody says 'we don't do silent movies anymore,' you agree with everybody, and you say 'yeah, you're right.' It was a fantasy.
Michel Hazanavicius
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Bernard Herrmann was a genius, a great, great composer.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I think the writer is always the creator, because he's starting with nothing, but the actor comes in and gives flesh and blood.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I love silent cinema but don't hold it sacred. Like any branch of film there are some very boring films alongside the masterpieces.
Michel Hazanavicius
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But sometimes I think you have to try to do things that people don't think are doable.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I think being a foreigner and talking about Hollywood allowed me to use some cliches and some references that an American would maybe not use.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I guess all the directors in France are influenced by Hitchcock, because he's the perfect visual director, in my eyes.
Michel Hazanavicius
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Sure, I watched a lot of Hollywood movies. Maybe I've seen more Hollywood movies than French movies
Michel Hazanavicius
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I looked at a lot of photos from Hollywood in the '20s, photographs of silent movies being filmed all over the world which are very specific and very evocative. Berenice, the lead actress, is my wife. She really followed the same path with me.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I thought 'The Artist' was a perfect way to find a good balance. The artistic challenge is obvious because the film is black-and-white and its silent, but I did my best to make the movie accessible and easy to watch. I really don't want to make elitist movies. I really try hard to work for the audience. Audiences are smart. They get everything.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I can say is usually people are slightly confused. They think that silent movies are old. But, the fact is, they are old because they have been made in the '20s. That's the thing that makes them old. Not the format. The format is just a format. It's not an old format.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I only have one obsession - not to be boring.
Michel Hazanavicius
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It's not my job. The Weinstein company, it's their job to convince people. My job was to make the movie. That's what I did. I know what we did in France was to have the maximum screenings just to let people talk about the movie and say they enjoyed the movie.
Michel Hazanavicius
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If you try to make a silent movie with a normal script and you just pull out the dialogue, you will have big problems with the actors because you will ask them to tell a story that you don't know.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I think we are at the very beginning of high changes, not only in terms of digital film, but in the way the movies will be screened, whether they'll be screened on phones, on computers - on everything
Michel Hazanavicius
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I guess George Clooney would be a wonderful silent actor, and Leonardo DiCaprio is such a wonderful actor he certainly could do it.
Michel Hazanavicius
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I think Hollywood is cleverer than you think. I'm not sure they will do it. I don't think so, but maybe I'm wrong. When we were doing the preparation of the movie, we didn't have all the money so we were looking for all the solutions possible, and 3D was one option.
Michel Hazanavicius