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You're Being Mean To Someone Who's Helping You. What Is That? Everyone Knows Who The Assholes Are, And I Avoid Them.
-Steven Soderbergh
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You're Being Mean To

Steven Soderbergh
You're Being Mean To Someone Who's Helping You. What Is That? Everyone Knows Who The Assholes Are, And I Avoid Them.
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Mean
Helping
Being Me
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You Got To Deal With Reviews The Same Way You Deal With Your Views, Which I A Long Time Ago Stopped Reading Because The Point Is If You Believe The Good Ones You Have To Believe The Bad Ones. It's Kind Of All Or Nothing.
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I Suppose I Could Try To Be Some Avant-garde Artist If I Wanted To, But That Doesn't Interest Me As Much.
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You Can Create Meaning Where There Was None, You Can Create Feeling Where There Was None, You Can Create Narrative Where There Was None. Two Frames Can Be The Difference Between Something That Works And Something That Doesn't. It's Fascinating.
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A Lot Of People Go To The Movies Wanting The Movie To Be About Feelings, And It's Really Not About That. Or Rather It's About Feelings In The Abstract.
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I'm Probably More Character-driven Than Plot-driven. It's Rare For Me To Attach Myself To An Idea For A Story.
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I Was Lucky That I Was Getting Exposed To A Lot Of Different Kinds Of Films, And I Was Liking Them All. So It Seemed Logical To Me That You Could - As In The Style Of The Studio Directors Of The 30s And 40s - Jump From One Genre To The Next, With The Same Satisfaction.
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I Stopped Reading Reviews About My Own Movies. I Read Stuff About Other People's Movies.
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I Want To Thank Anyone Who Spends Part Of Their Day Creating...anybody Who Spends Part Of Their Day Sharing Their Experience With Us-i Think This World Would Be Unlivable Without Art And I Thank You.
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Thinking
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The Traditional Models For Success Are Just Also Disappearing.
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People
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My Working Life Is Me Doing What I Want To Do. This Is That. I've Made Movies That People Don't Go To See.
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Another Thing That Really Excites Me: I'd Like To Do Multiple Versions Of The Same Film.
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The Muscle Memory Of Filtering Away All The Wrong Versions Of What You're Doing Improves The More Time You're On A Film Set. I Feel Like My Problem-solving Algorithm Got Kicked Up A Notch.
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Reality Shows Are All The Rage On Tv At The Moment, But Thats Not Reality, Its Just Another Aesthetic Form Of Fiction.
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A Real Explosion Is Not Only Much More Fun To Shoot, It Also Helps The Actors And Creates An Energy On Set And Ultimately In The Scene.
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The Great Thing About The Business Is How Darwinian It Is. We Have To Swim Or Die - If You Are Found Wanting Over A Period Of Time, You've Either Got To Change What You're Doing Or Find Something Else To Do.
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I Think '60s Are Appealing To Creative People, Because It Seemed To Be A Time Of Endless Possibilities, When The Boundaries Of What Could Be Considered Popular Culture Were Being Expanded Almost By The Week. It Doesn't Feel Like That Anymore. At Times, I Wish It Were So. Radio Is A Perfect Example; Good God, I Mean, Back Then The Most Interesting Songs Were Also Hits, And That's Just Not True Anymore. It Hasn't Been True In A Long Time.
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Mean
Thinking
I've Begun To Believe More And More That Movies Are All About Transitions, That The Key To Making Good Movies Is To Pay Attention To The Transition Between Scenes. And Not Just How You Get From One Scene To The Next, But Where You Leave A Scene And Where You Come Into A New Scene. Those Are Some Of The Most Important Decisions That You Make. It Can Be The Difference Between A Movie That Works And A Movie That Doesn't.
Believe
Keys
Differences
Maybe I'll Paint, Do Photography, Just Something Else. I Can See That.
Photography
Paint
I Can
I Think That It's Fear. The Musicians Themselves Don't Seem To Know Enough About Why They're In The Positions They're In, So They're Afraid To Lose Those Positions. If You're 22 Years Old And You Can't Believe You're Even In The Position To Have A Career Making Music, The First Thing You're Going To Think Is: Maintain. Don't Lose It. And That's Precisely What Causes You To Lose Everything.
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Thinking
Years
You're Being Mean To Someone Who's Helping You. What Is That? Everyone Knows Who The Assholes Are, And I Avoid Them.
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Helping
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Your Take On Things Is What Is Either Going To Make You Somebody People Talk About Or No.
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I Tend To Be Drawn More To People Than Pure Story Ideas.
Ideas
People
Stories
If You're Not Smart Enough To Know What Fidel Meant During The Cuban Revolution, That - When They Were On The Granma - Fidel Was Already A Rock Star In Cuba, And How Important That Was To The Indigenous Population, Then You're Not Paying Attention.
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Smart
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I'm A Grinder. I'll Beat You Because I Will Not Sleep.
Sleep
Beats
Grinder
Stuff I Like Is Getting Trashed And Stuff That Is Being Praised I Think Is Terrible. I Don't Really Feel In Sync With What's Happening, But At The Same Time, What I Think Keeps Me Afloat Is That I Try Not To Be, And Don't Want To Be, Very Indulgent. I Try To Make The Films As Lean As Possible, And To Not Spend A Lot Of Time Crawling Up My Own Ass Creatively.
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Trying
I Don't Consider Myself To Be Particularly Gifted In The Way That Other Filmmakers Are Gifted.
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Gifted
There's Nothing Else Exactly Like It In Any Other Art Form, The Orchestration Of So Many Different Elements. It's Endlessly Fascinating What Can Be Done Editorially. You Can Create Meaning Where There Was None, You Can Create Feeling Where There Was None, You Can Create Narrative Where There Was None. Two Frames Can Be The Difference Between Something That Works And Something That Doesn't. It's Fascinating.
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Two
Differences
It Takes One Asshole To Ruin The Whole Thing. That's It. One. The Problem With The World Is One Asshole Comes Up With A Really Bad Idea And Now We're All Taking Our Shoes Off At The Airport.
Airports
Shoes
Ideas
I'm In The Process Of Working Out An Arrangement To Make Some Very, Very, Very Small Films In The Midst Of All These Films And Maybe That Will Help. But You Get Tired Of Talking. You Just Want To Do It.
Tired
Talking
Work Out
I Just Find It Annoying That In These Sequences [of The Fight Scenes], Traditionally, There's Music Trying To Pump You Up. I Don't Like That, Personally, As An Audience Member. This Just Reflects My Taste.
Fighting
Trying
Pumps
I Was Thinking That People Have To Believe You're Crazy In Order To Take You Seriously As An Artist. If You're Wandering The Streets, Talking In Gibberish, Nobody Ever Asks You To Change Anything About Your Art Because There's No Context For People To Look At What You Do.
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Crazy
Believe
I Like To Know Where I Am. I Don't Like The Kind Of Cutting Where You Don't Know Where You Are.
Cutting
Kind
We're All Standing On The Shoulders Of What Other People Have Done. But You're Supposed To Take That And Add Your Own Sauce. It Can Be Intimidating, Believe Me.
Believe
People
Add
A Movie Is Something You See, Cinema Is Something That’s Made.
Cinema
Made
I Guess I Didn't Feel Confident Enough To Be Searching In A Big Public Way. I Was Very Content At The Time To Toil In Obscurity On Things That I Thought Might Point Me In Certain Directions Or Teach Me Certain Things - Not Knowing What That Would Be.
Knowing
Toil
Would Be
Lying Is Like Alcoholism. You Are Always Recovering.
Liars
Lying
Recovery
My Experience Over The Years With Working With People Who Are Not Actors Or Not Trained Actors Is That You Have To Get To Know Them Well Enough To See What They Have That's Translatable Onto The Screen.
People
Enough
In Full Frontal And K Street, I Learned To Take Advantage Of The Mobility That Digital Provides.
Mobility
Digital
Advantage
I'm Not Precious About Anything. The Effort It Took To Get Something Means Nothing To Me In Post. It Means Nothing To The Audience. I'll Chop Limbs Off. I'll Put An Arm Where A Leg Should Be. I'll Do Anything.
Mean
Effort
Legs
I've Never Been A Snob. It [movie] Is Just About Stories. And I've Never Felt Just Because It's A Big Screen And You Plop Down Your Eight Bucks That Gives It A Special Meaning. It's Just "are You Good At Telling A Story?"
Eight
Giving
Special
I'm Sure Some People Will Say, 'why Do This?' And My Response Is, 'why Wouldn't You?' The Film Business In General Is Using A Model That Is Outdated And, Worse Than That, Inefficient.
People
Film
Outdated
If You're Not Flying People Around On Wires, And You're Only Allowing Them To Do Things That People Can Really Do, It Can't Go On For Very Long, Because Eventually Somebody Gets The Drop On The Other Person And Then It's Over.
Long
People
Flying
I'm Always A Little Unnerved When I See A Show That's Set In The Past That Implies In Any Way That Things Were Nicer Then.
Past
Littles
Way
Everything Is The Director's Fault - You Can Quote Me On That. There Are No Excuses.
Directors
Faults
No Excuses
I Like A Lot Of Different Kinds Of Movies, I Like A Lot Of Different Kinds Of Paintings.
Different
Painting
Kind
Making A Film That's Supposed To Be Fun To Watch Is Really Hard - That's The Weird Irony Of It.
Fun
Watches
Irony
American Movie Audiences Now Just Don’t Seem To Be Very Interested In Any Kind Of Ambiguity Or Any Kind Of Real Complexity Of Character Or Narrative - I’m Talking In Large Numbers, There Are Always Some, But Enough To Make Hits Out Of Movies That Have Those Qualities. I Think Those Qualities Are Now Being Seen On Television And That People Who Want To See Stories That Have Those Kinds Of Qualities Are Watching Television.
Real
Character
Thinking
Well, It's 15 Years Since Sex, Lies And Videotape, And If You Hang Around Long Enough You're Having The Same Arguments With Just A New Set Of People Every Few Years And It Gets Boring.
Sex
Lying
Years
What Are The Stories You Want People To Tell About You?
People
Stories
Want
It's A Weird Thing To Say, But It Would Appear To Me Axiomatic That If You Understood Fully What I Was Doing And Appreciated It, You Would Like It.
Appreciated
Weird Things
Understood
When A Film Like Chris Nolan's Memento Cannot Get Picked Up, To Me Independent Film Is Over. It's Dead.
Independent
Film
Memento
I Guess Why The Ocean's Films Are Hard For Me Is Because On The One Hand You Have To Make Sure The Performances Are There, But On The Other Hand It's A Film That Demands, To My Mind, A Very Layered And Complex Visual Scheme. That Takes A Lot Of Time To Figure Out.
Ocean
Hands
Mind
To Me The Director’s Job Is To Leave It In Better Shape Than You Found It, Literally.
Jobs
Umpires
Directors
I'm Mystified By The Stuff That Doesn't Work. I'm Mystified By What's Going On In The Critical Side, Too. Stuff I Like Is Getting Trashed And Stuff That Is Being Praised I Think Is Terrible. I Don't Really Feel In Sync With What's Happening, But At The Same Time, What I Think Keeps Me Afloat Is That I Try Not To Be, And Don't Want To Be, Very Indulgent. I Try To Make The Films As Lean As Possible, And To Not Spend A Lot Of Time Crawling Up My Own Ass Creatively.
Thinking
Trying
Film
I'm Not Precious About Anything. The Effort It Took To Get Something Means Nothing To Me In Post.and It Means Nothing To The Audience. I'll Chop Limbs Off. I'll Put An Arm Where A Leg Should Be. I'll Do Anything.
Mean
Effort
Audience
I Like To Make All Kinds Of Movies. I'd Do 'ocean's Thirteen' With The Right Script.
Movie
Ocean
Scripts
A Movie That Costs Only $1.6 Million Doesn't Have To Be A Cultural Event To Turn A Profit.
Movie
Inspiring
Events
Never Had A Cup Of Coffee In My Life. Dr Pepper Is My Caffeine Delivery System Of Choice.
Coffee
Choices
Drs
"a Meteor Hits Planet Earth" - That's A Story Idea But That Doesn't Give Me Any Indication Of What The Character Is.
Character
Ideas
Giving
You Can't Get Good At Anything Unless You Do It Day In And Day Out, Over And Over.
The Brief Flashbacks Are Sun-kissed, Summery And Optimistic. It's The Only Place In The Movie You Will See Red, Yellow, Orange, Or Any Vibrant Colors.
Optimistic
Color
Yellow
Every Time You Make Something That Somebody Likes, Your Impulse Is To Remind Them That If You Hadn't Made Some Of These Other Things That They Hated, You Wouldn't Have Been Able To Make The Thing That They Liked.
Able
Likes
Made
[i Watch] Fincher, Spielberg, Cameron, Mctiernan. Just People Who Are Good At Staging Action. I Like To Know Where I Am. I Don't Like The Kind Of Cutting Where You Don't Know Where You Are.
Cutting
People
Watches
I Feel I Need To Really Think About Whether There's A Way To Use What Skill I Have To Address Things That Outrage Me, Like The 13 Year Old Girl Getting Stoned To Death. Because I Don't Think Making A Movie Is Going To Help That, Or Change That.
Girl
Thinking
Years
My First Three Movies, I Didn't Start Editing Until We Were Finished Shooting. That's Unthinkable To Me Now.
Editing
Three
Shooting
I Want To Form A Political Party That's Based Entirely On What Music People Listen To. To Me, It's A Much Better Barometer Of What They Think And Feel Than Their Political Stance.
Party
Thinking
People
I Try To Use Other Songs Or Bands As Reference Points - It Seems Like The Easiest Way To Get Across What Are Really Differences Of Taste Or Opinion. If You Know What Kind Of Music Somebody Loves, Then You Can Kind Of Figure Out Why They Do What They Do.
Song
Differences
Trying
But My Sense In Talking To People When I Travel Is That The Film Business Is Not That Dissimilar From A Lot Of Other Businesses.
Travel
Talking
People
If You Think That Because You're Che, When You Go Into Bolivia, When People Find Out It's You, That They're Going To Have The Same Kind Of Reaction That The Cubans Had To Castro, Then You're High.
Thinking
People
Bolivia
There Are People Who Are Originals And The Stuff They Make Really Is New. It Isn't Based On Anything Else. But I've Decided I'm Not That-i Was Never That. My Abilities Are To Synthesize A Wide Range Of References And Ideas Into Something That Feels Relatively Unified And Coherent.
Ideas
People
Stuff
Castro, Without Question, Is One Of The Smartest Politicians That's Ever Walked.
Politician
Castro
Everybody, Including Me, Has To Submit To What It Needs To Be. The Thing Is At The Top Of The Pyramid, The Best Version Of The Thing; We All Have To Serve That. You Forget That At Your Own Risk. And I Think Movies Are Too Long, In General.
Thinking
Long
Risk
I Guess I Just Look At Talent As A Very Subjective Thing. I Mean, If You Never Tried Playing An Oboe, How Do You Know You're Not The Most Talented Oboe Player Ever? The Point Is That If You Don't Love It, Then It Doesn't Matter.
Mean
Player
Oboes
Everything Had Been Done Long Before I Started Making Movies. I Mean, There's Nothing That Godard Hasn't Already Done. You Can't Do A Single Thing That Godard Hasn't Already Thought Of. And So You Struggle To Do Something That Is Not Predictable.
Struggle
Mean
Long
Anytime You've Got Something That Can Take You Into The Political Realm Then You've Opened Up The Conversation A Lot.
Political
Conversation
Realms
Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.


2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.


2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.


2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.


3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.


3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.


3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.



4. Proper Usage of Quotes


4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.


4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.


4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).


5. Common Mistakes to Avoid


5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.


5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.


5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.



6. Quotes in Different Contexts


6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.


6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.


6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.



7. Punctuation and Formatting


Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:


Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.


Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.


Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.



8. Ethical Considerations


Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes


Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.



Conclusion


Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.


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