Stanley Kubrick quotes

Stanley Kubrick was an American film director, screenwriter, and producer, renowned for his innovative and influential movies. His body of work spans multiple genres and is praised for its meticulous craftsmanship and thought-provoking themes. He is regarded as one of the greatest filmmakers in the history of cinema. Here are 47 of his quotes:

If it can be written, or thought, it can be filmed.

Stanley Kubrick

Perhaps it sounds ridiculous, but the best thing that young filmmakers should do is to get hold of a camera and some film and make a movie of any kind at all.

Stanley Kubrick

One man writes a novel. One man writes a symphony. It is essential that one man make a film.

Stanley Kubrick

However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.

Stanley Kubrick

It's a mistake to confuse pity with love.

Stanley Kubrick

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.

Stanley Kubrick

I never learned anything at all in school and didn't read a book for pleasure until I was 19 years old.

Stanley Kubrick

If you can talk brilliantly about a problem, it can create the consoling illusion that it has been mastered.

Stanley Kubrick

You're an idealist, and I pity you as I would the village idiot.

Stanley Kubrick

When a man cannot choose, he ceases to be a man.

Stanley Kubrick

You sit at the board and suddenly your heart leaps. Your hand trembles to pick up the piece and move it. But what chess teaches you is that you must sit there calmly and think about whether it's really a good idea and whether there are other, better ideas.

Stanley Kubrick

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.

Stanley Kubrick

The screen is a magic medium. It has such power that it can retain interest as it conveys emotions and moods that no other art form can hope to tackle.

Stanley Kubrick

I don't like doing interviews. There is always the problem of being misquoted or, what's even worse, of being quoted exactly.

Stanley Kubrick

The first really important book I read about filmmaking was The Film Technique by Pudovkin. This was some time before I had ever touched a movie camera and it opened my eyes to cutting and montage.

Stanley Kubrick

When I made my first film, I think the thing was probably helped me the most was that it was such an unusual thing to do in the early 50s for someone who actually go and make a film. People thought it was impossible. It really is terribly easy. All anybody needs is a camera, a tape recorder, and some imagination.

Stanley Kubrick

The whole idea of god is absurd. If anything, '2001' shows that what some people call 'god' is simply an acceptable term for their ignorance. What they don't understand, they call 'god' -Stanley Kubrick, interview, 1963.

Stanley Kubrick

Include utter banalities.

Stanley Kubrick

I have always enjoyed dealing with a slightly surrealistic situation and presenting it in a realistic manner.

Stanley Kubrick

The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning.

Stanley Kubrick

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Stanley Kubrick

I've never been certain whether the moral of the Icarus story should only be, as is generally accepted, ‘don't try to fly too high,' or whether it might also be thought of as ‘forget the wax and feathers, and do a better job on the wings.

Stanley Kubrick