Screenplay Quotes

“Personality begins where comparison leaves off. Be unique. Be memorable. Be confident. Be proud.”
― Shannon L. Alder

“My philosophy is that worrying means you suffer twice.”
― J.K. Rowling, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: The Original Screenplay

“Our fingerprints don't fade from the lives we've touched.”
― Will Fetters, Memoirs

“Captain Harvile: Poor Phoebe, she would not have forgotten him so soon. It was not in her nature.

Anne Elliot: It would not be in the nature of any woman who truly loved.

Captain Harvile: Do you claim that for your sex?

Anne Elliot: We do not forget you as soon as you forget us. We cannot help ourselves. We live at home, quiet, confined, and our feelings prey upon us. You always have business of some sort or other to take you back into the world.

Captain Harvile: I won't allow it to be any more man's nature than women's to be inconstant or to forget those they love or have loved. I believe the reverse. I believe... Let me just observe that all histories are against you, all stories, prose, and verse. I do not think I ever opened a book in my life which did not have something to say on women's fickleness.

Anne Elliot: But they were all written by men. ”
― Jane Austen

“……, but as I am a scholar I feel obliged to document what it is like here, most of the time, between the dramatic climaxes. In truth it is like this: You cannot imagine how time can be so still. It hangs. It weighs, and yet there is so little of it. It goes so slowly and it is so scarce. If I was writing this scene it would last a full 15 minutes. I would lie here and you would sit there.”
― Margaret Edson, Wit

“The symptoms of a writer who hasn’t found their way clear of the needs of Self yet are easy to spot. I should say the symptoms are easy for everyone else to spot, that is, and not so easy for the writer themself to see. You’ll see a writer who does not trust the characters to speak and move on their own, but has to puppeteer them; a writer who does not trust the reader to understand what’s written. One who must insert parentheticals in various forms to explain the work to the reader; flashbacks to explain; big black blocks of text on the page to explain; question-and-answer dialog between characters who aren’t in a courtroom; walk-and-talk characters with their mouths full of dialog of what the story is about; too many stage directions that make the script read like a novel…”
― Dan Joseph Decker, ANATOMY OF A SCREENPLAY THIRD EDITION

“A movie: tells the story; of a person(s); in the pursuit of an Objective(s); in the face of Opposition(s); with someone to talk to; with an underlying theme, in a clearly defined genre; with an emotionally satisfying resolution. Does yours?”
― Dan Joseph Decker, ANATOMY OF A SCREENPLAY THIRD EDITION

“I wish I knew how to get you back. And apparently fate won't let me give up"


From Central Park Song: a Screenplay”
― Zack Love, Stories and Scripts: an Anthology

“In a movie, people only talk when they want something. If your characters are not pursuing their needs in the scene, they are invariably talking about the movie they are in.”
― Dan Joseph Decker, ANATOMY OF A SCREENPLAY THIRD EDITION

“Sadness is just happiness turned on its ass—it's all showbiz!”
― Guy Maddin

“La cosa più difficile quando si scrive è sapere che cosa scrivere”
― Syd Field

“Certain words, certain expressions. Things like ‘I love you’ and ‘I hate you.’ They’re big traps for actors. They can tempt you away from the connection you’ve developed with your partner and lead you into swamplands of clichéd performing. ‘Love’ and ‘hate’ are powerful words, and for some reason, we feel like we must fulfill them—and other words like them—whenever we say them. But we don’t have to.”

Bill turns to Adam. “Actors hit that line—‘you know I’m absolutely crazy about you. Don’t you?’—and go all kablooey. Your head’s saying, ‘How can I not say a line like that without letting love swim into the duck pond? But inside you’re saying, ‘To hell will love! This girl’s really pissed me off, breaking off an important date like that.’ Follow your true inner response. It will never lead you astray. You’ll be bubbling up with impatience and irritation and you’ll say a line like that and it’ll have new meaning. It’ll have your meaning. Remember: Bad actors consciously adjust their inner responses to what they think the lines of the text require. Good actors adjust the text to the inner emotional line created by their sensitized responses to the other actor.”

Adam says, “I get it. I was trying to act the words.”

Bill nods. “You were manipulating yourself, cutting off our real response in order to live up to what you thought the text demanded of you. But any line can mean anything, and come out of you in any way.”
― William Esper, The Actor's Art and Craft: William Esper Teaches the Meisner Technique

“Would you not say that peace is the greatest desire of true soldiers? Do we not have the most to lose from war? And businesses, most of them except military and oil ones, most of them have a vested interest in peace and prosperity. You cannot sell a house to a war refugee living in a tent, can you? Really hard tto sell an iPhone to a shattered victim. Businesses and corporatoons run this country. So yuou have to approach them with logic. Emotional appeals to the hippies of this world will not change minds. Stick to logic.

- Shane Gibson, candidate for Governor, THE PLATOS ASCENSION BRIEF.”
― Earl Devere

“If the director himself writes the script or screenplay of the drama, movie etc., the direction becomes perfect because he already imagined each shot nicely in his brain while writing the screenplay!”
― Md. Ziaul Haque

“They tell us not to follow the stars and that it is blasphemous but the same people tell us the story of Three Wise Men that found the Son of Suns by following the same stars.

We should learn that following those tiny lights that protest total darkness and smile at the moon no matter her mood, is the route to sunrise. Those lights are the seedlings of your own faith in tomorrow...

(Screenplay)”
― Nicole Bonomi

“Someone might ask, if the dynamic of innovation consists of schema and revision, where does true originality come from? Is there no single work we can point to as the ultimate source of this or that new storrytelling strategy? I'm inclined to say there is no such source. Artists working in mass art forms find originality by revising schemas in circulation, or by revising ones that have fallen into disuse.”
― David Bordwell, Reinventing Hollywood: How 1940s Filmmakers Changed Movie Storytelling

“You don't talk; you watch talk shows. You don't play games; you watch game shows.

Travel, relationships, risk: Every meaningful experience must be packaged and delivered to you to watch at a distance, so that you can remain ever sheltered, ever passive, ever ravenous consumers who can't bring themselves to rise from their couches, break a sweat, and participate in life.”
― Brad Bird

“An author is an expert in the written word. The author must make a choice; to either trust and support the filmmaker’s approach, or not have a film made at all.”
― Sarah Gerdes, Author Straight Talk

“দি ডিরেক্টর নিজে নাটক, চলচ্চিত্র ইত্যাদির চিত্রনাট্য লিখেন, তবে ডিরেকশন নিখুঁত হয় কারণ তিনি চিত্রনাট্য লেখার সময় প্রতিটি শট তার মস্তিষ্কে সুন্দরভাবে কল্পনা করে নেন!”
― Md. Ziaul Haque

“যদি ডিরেক্টর নিজে নাটক, চলচ্চিত্র ইত্যাদির চিত্রনাট্য লিখেন, তবে ডিরেকশন নিখুঁত হয় কারণ তিনি চিত্রনাট্য লেখার সময় প্রতিটি শট তার মস্তিষ্কে সুন্দরভাবে কল্পনা করে নেন!”
― Md. Ziaul Haque

“No. You got it wrong. It’s not
about sounding all nasal. It’s
about sounding like you don’t have
a care. Like your bills are paid
and you’re happy about your future
and you’re about to jump in your
Ferrari when you get off this call.
Put some extra breath in there.
Breezy, like you don’t need this
money, like you never been fired,
only laid off. It’s not what all
White people sound like- there
ain’t no real White voice, but it’s
what they wish they sounded like.
It’s what they think they’re
supposed to sound like.”
― Boots Riley, Sorry To Bother You

“You honor me by bringing Death to my front door.”
― Darek Kolstad, Shay Hatten. Chris Collins, Marc Abrams

“You stay alive, no matter what occurs! I will find you. No matter how long it takes, no matter how far, I will find you.”
― Michael Mann

“Story determines structure; structure doesn't determine story.”
― Syd Field, Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting Paperback – November 29, 2005

“The scope of knowledge is infinite. Creative research is the headwaters of art and knowledge.”
― DB Thakuri, HEADWATERS OF SCREENWRITING: The Art of Crafting Original Screenplays

“Mechanical rule produces similar stories like goods produced in a plant. Every strong and original narrative structure is crafted personally. The unique philosophical belief system, as well as the cultural value of a particular society, is the ultimate headwaters of original and compelling narrative structure.”
― DB Thakuri, HEADWATERS OF SCREENWRITING: The Art of Crafting Original Screenplays

“A mix of local news, world news, and shocking headlines coupled with experience and real life scenarios coated with imagination and intimate thoughts... the ones you can't say aloud = BOOKS”
― Niedria Kenny, Order in the Courtroom: The Tale of a Texas Poker Player

“You don't talk; you watch talk shows. You don't play games; you watch game shows.”
― Brad Bird

“I heal through scripts, showcasing life” — Yvonne Padmos, The Challenge: 50 Filmscripts*”
― Yvonne Padmos

“A movie, I think, is really only four or five moments between two people. The rest of it exists to give those moments their impact and resonance.”
― Robert Towne