George Lucas: Thing

George Lucas is American film producer. Explore interesting quotes on thing.
George Lucas: 74   quotes 8   likes

“A lot of people like to do certain things, but they're not
that good at it. Keep going through the things that you like
to do, until you find something that you actually seem to be
extremely good at. It can be anything.”

George Lucas
People

“A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing.”

George Lucas

Star Wars to Jedi: The Making of a Saga (1983) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykmZp5cgbkU
Context: One of the fatal mistakes that almost every science-fiction film makes is that they spend so much time on the settings — you know, creating the environment — that they spend film time on it. And you don't have to spend too much film time to create an environment. What they're doing is showing off the amount of work that they generated, and it slows the pace of the film down. And the story is not the settings. The story is the stories, plot. You're always surprised with characters, I mean in film it's even more dramatic than it is in writing, because eventually you actually take a real person and stick them into that character. And that real person brings with him, or her, an enormous package of reality. I mean, Threepio is just a hunk of plastic, and without Tony Daniels in there it just isn't anything at all. In the first film we had maybe 20 colors to paint with, and this time we've had 40 colors to paint with. Well, that doesn't mean it's going to be a better painting. Special effects are just a tool, a means of telling a story. People have a tendency to confuse them as an end to themselves. A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing.

“One of the amazing things about 'Seven Samurai' is that there are a lot of characters. And considering you have so many, and they all have shaved heads, and you've got good guys and bad guys and peasants, you get to understand a lot of them without too much being said.”

George Lucas

George Lucas, in Marc Lee Film-makers on film: George Lucas http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/filmmakersonfilm/3642010/Film-makers-on-film-George-Lucas.html, The Telegraph, 14 May 2005
2000s

Guy , Understanding

“We say, 'We think you are a talented, functioning person, and we are hiring you because of your abilities, and whatever you come up with, we're going to take.' If we make a mistake, it will be in picking the wrong person. What we're striving for is total freedom, where we can finance our pictures, make them our way, release them where we want them released and be completely free to express ourselves. That's very hard to do in the world of business. In this country, the only thing that speaks is money and you have to have the money in order to have the power to be free. So the danger is — in being as oppressive as the next guy to the people below you. We're going to do everything possible to avoid that pitfall. But if we fail, it's another saga in the history of man…”

George Lucas

On how American Zoetrope functions
1970s, Interview with Judy Stone (1971)

Money , People , World , Way

“As you go through history, I didn't think it was going to get quite this close. So it's just one of those recurring things… I hope this doesn't come true in our country. Maybe the film will waken people to the situation. … When I wrote it [Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith], Iraq didn't exist… We were just funding Saddam Hussein and giving him weapons of mass destruction. We didn't think of him as an enemy at that time. We were going after Iran and using him as our surrogate, just as we were doing in Vietnam… The parallels between what we did in Vietnam and what we're doing in Iraq now are unbelievable…”

George Lucas

"Star Wars Raises Questions On U.S. Policy" WBZTV CBS 4 Boston (2005)

War , People , Hope , History

“[In ancient Rome, ] why did the senate after killing Caesar turn around and give the government to his nephew? Why did France after they got rid of the king and that whole system turn around and give it to Napoleon? It's the same thing with Germany and Hitler. … You sort of see these recurring themes where a democracy turns itself into a dictatorship, and it always seems to happen kind of in the same way, with the same kinds of issues, and threats from the outside, needing more control. A democratic body, a senate, not being able to function properly because everybody's squabbling, there's corruption.”

George Lucas

"Star Wars Raises Questions On U.S. Policy" WBZTV CBS 4 Boston (2005)

Way , Democracy

“The truth is, the only thing I was inspired by was the fact that it's told from the point of view of two peasants, who get mixed up with a samurai and princess and a lot of very high-level people.”

George Lucas

George Lucas, in Marc Lee "Film-makers on film: George Lucas"
2000s

People , Truth , Princess

“Pleasure's fun. It's great, but you can't keep it going forever; just accept the fact that it's here and it's gone, and maybe then again, it will come back, and you'll get to do it again. Joy lasts forever. Pleasure is purely self-centered. It's all about your pleasure: it's about you. It's a selfish, self-centered emotion, that is created by a self-centered motive of greed. Joy is compassion. Joy is giving yourself to somebody else, or something else. And it's a kind of thing that is, in its subtlety and lowness, much more powerful than pleasure. You get hung up on pleasure; you're doomed. If you pursue joy; you will find everlasting happiness.”

George Lucas

Academy of Achievement Address, published by Corporate Valley (12 August 2013) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54xWQPq0fuk
2010s

Pleasure , Motivation , Joy , Selfishness