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George Lucas

George Lucas Quotes

Film director

George Lucas, born on May 14, 1944, is a renowned film director and producer from the United States. He is best known for his groundbreaking film works, particularly the 'Star Wars' and 'Indiana Jones' franchises, which have had a profound impact on the global film industry.

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Famous George Lucas Quotes

“I am more of a visual person than a verbal person. For me, I think, the excitement is the fact that I found a way of telling the story as I want to tell it, in a medium that I could master.”

Thinking Way Want Persons Facts Stories Found Masters Mediums Excitement Visuals

Author:George Lucas

“Although I write screenplays, I don't think I'm a very good writer. I'm very interested in studying cultures and social issues, but as an academic I don't think I would have been too successful.”

Thinking Writing Has Beens Culture Social Study Issues Successful Very Good Academic Social Issues Screenplays Good Writers

Author:George Lucas

“There wasn't much as a kid that inspired me in what I did as an adult.”

Kids Adults Inspired

Author:George Lucas

“I was always extremely curious about why people did the things they do.”

Author:George Lucas

“I wanted to transfer to an art school, and ended up going to the University of Southern California. They had a cinematography school, and I said "Well, that's sort of like photography, maybe that will be interesting." And once I started in that department, I found what it was that I loved and was good at.”

Wells Art Said Wanted School Found Interesting Photography University California Department Southern Transfers Art School Cinematography Southern California

Author:George Lucas

“A talent is a combination of something you love a great deal and something you can lose yourself in - something that you can start at 9 o'clock, look up from your work and it's 10 o'clock at night.”

Looks Night Loses Deals Talent Combination Clock Look Up Losing Yourself Something You Love

Author:George Lucas

“Learning to make films is very easy. Learning what to make films about is very hard. What you’ve really got to do is focus on learning as much about life, and about various aspects of it first.”

Firsts Hard Film Easy Focus Aspect Various

Author:George Lucas

“You don't see the struggle part of a person's life. You only see the success they have.”

Persons Struggle

Author:George Lucas

“I haven't met anybody who hasn't been able to describe years and years and years of very, very difficult struggle through the whole process of achieving anything whatsoever. And there's no way to sort of get around that.”

Way Years Whole Able Process Difficult Struggle Achieve Havens Mets

Author:George Lucas

“I've had much more down in my life than I've had up. And much more struggle. First of all, when I went into the film school everybody said, "What are you doing? This is a complete dead-end for a career."”

Firsts Said Ends School Film Careers Struggle Dead Ends Film School

Author:George Lucas

“I want to live where I want to live, and I will make films because I love to make films.”

Author:George Lucas

“As I talk to film students now especially, I say, "The easiest job you'll ever get is to try to make your first film." That's the easy one to get, is the first film because nobody knows whether you can make a film or not.”

Knows Trying Firsts Jobs Film Easy Nobody Knows

Author:George Lucas

“After you've done the first feature, then you have heck of a difficult time getting your second film off the ground. They look at your first film and they say, "Oh well, we don't want you anymore."”

Want Firsts Wells Looks Done Film Difficult Features Difficult Times Oh Well

Author:George Lucas

“I came from a very avant-garde documentary kind of film making world. I like cinema verité, documentaries. I liked non-story, non-character tone poems. And that's the film making that I was interested in.”

World Kind Character Stories Film Cinema Tone Documentaries Avant Garde

Author:George Lucas

“It took me three, four years, to get from my first film to my second film, banging on doors, trying to get people to give me a chance. Writing, struggling, with no money in the bank, working as an editor on the side. Working as a cameraman on the side. Getting little jobs, eking out a living. Trying to stay alive, and pushing a script that nobody wanted.”

“It's not a matter of how well can you make a movie. It's how well can you make it under the circumstance, because there's always circumstances. You cannot use that as an excuse.”

Wells Matter Use Circumstances Excuse

Author:George Lucas

“You can't put a title card at the head of the movie and say, "Well, we really had a bad problem. You know, the actor got sick and it rained this day and we had a hurricane."”

Knows Wells Problem Actors Sick Cards Titles This Day Hurricanes

Author:George Lucas

“You really have to focus on what you're doing and just plow ahead no matter what hurdles are thrown in front of you.”

Matter Focus Fronts No Matter What Thrown Hurdle

Author:George Lucas

“There wasn't anything in my life that was going to stop me from making movies.”

Author:George Lucas

“All of my films have been very hard to understand at the script stage because they're very different. At the time I did them they were not conventional. The executives could only think in terms of what they'd already seen. It's hard for them to think in terms of what has never been done before.”

Thinking Has Beens Different Hard Done Film Term Stage Scripts Executives Conventional

Author:George Lucas

“Whenever you're making a movie, especially when you're writing, you always have self-doubts.”

Writing Self Doubt Self-doubt

Author:George Lucas

“You try to get yourself into a situation where you only have to answer to yourself, where you can ask advice of people and work with your peers and mentors and things to try to do the best job that you can possibly do.”

People Trying Jobs Asks Answers Situation Advice Mentor Peers Do The Best Best Job

Author:George Lucas

“There's nothing worse than the frustration of having somebody who you feel doesn't get what you're doing, trying to turn it into something else. It's a very, very annoying and sort of frustrating thing and I just never wanted to go through it. I was very fortunate as I came up through the film business that I was able to insulate myself from that.”

Feels Trying Able Wanted Film Turns Fortunate Frustration Annoying Frustrating Frustrating Things

Author:George Lucas

“Sometimes people are surprised to learn that most of the films I've made don't work. They've been released but nobody has ever seen them. Maybe 40 percent of them are very successful. That's a very high percentage; most people have maybe 10 or 15 percent of their films work.”

People Made Sometimes Film Successful Percent Percentages

Author:George Lucas

“When my films don't work it's usually because I tried some very experimental idea. I tried new ideas and they just didn't work, as opposed to trying to do something conventional and having it be so conventional nobody wanted to see it.”

Trying Ideas Wanted Film Working It Conventional New Ideas

Author:George Lucas

“I'm very proud of all the movies I made. I am very happy with everything I've done. I like to watch my movies. Some of them work. Some of them don't. Some of them people like, most of them they don't.”

People Made Done Watches Proud Very Happy

Author:George Lucas

“I like making movies. I like the process. I like trying out new ideas, and if they don't work, they don't work. That's the reason I generated the money in the first place, to be able to try things. That's where I spend my money.”

Ifs Trying Firsts Ideas Reason Able Process New Ideas

Author:George Lucas

“I think crossing into the digital age is the big move for the industry. I think it will be the biggest thing that's happened while I've been making movies. I equate it to the invention of color or sound, and I don't see any other major technical process coming along and changing that.”

Thinking Bigs Age Moving Process Sound Happened Color Industry Majors Invention Digital Crossings Digital Age

Author:George Lucas

“I think there are going to be some social changes that take place due to the Internet, and the availability of the tools to more and more people. I think you are going to find a lot of people re-cutting movies and changing them, making them into their own movies.”

People Thinking Social Cutting Internet Tools Dues Social Change Availability

Author:George Lucas

“Success is a very difficult thing. It's much more difficult than one might think.”

Thinking Might Difficult Difficult Things

Author:George Lucas

“You need to have a lot of close family around you, a lot of friends to keep you honest. Take your time, take a year and just slow everything down a little bit. Get away from the success part, stay with yourself. Go off on a beach somewhere or do something to keep yourself aligned right.”

Needs Years Littles Bits Honest Little Bit Beach Get Away Lots Of Friends Take Your Time Close Family

Author:George Lucas

“When a movie comes out, I always go off on a beach so I miss all the craziness that goes on, all the hoopla, and the hype and the success, and how much it's making, or whether it's doing good or whether it's doing bad. I just miss it all. I don't talk to anybody, and a couple weeks later I come back and it's all over with.”

Week Missing Goes On Couple Beach Doing Good Hype Craziness

Author:George Lucas

“Over time I began to realize that the level of cinema criticism in the last part of XX century in the United States was pretty low. The institution itself is not what it's supposed to be, and I realized that I didn't need to take that seriously.”

Needs States Lasts Realizing Levels United United States Century Lows Criticism Institutions I Realized Supposed To Be Cinema

Author:George Lucas

“The older you get, the less seriously you take criticism. I've gotten to a point now where I ignore it completely. It's just not relevant to me anymore.”

Criticism Relevant

Author:George Lucas

“You have to have a thick enough skin to cope with the criticism. I'm very self-critical and I have a lot of friends that I trust who are film directors and writers and people in my profession.”

People Self Enough Film Directors Criticism Skins Critical Profession Thick Lots Of Friends Film Directors

Author:George Lucas

“I've discovered that most critics themselves are cinematically illiterate. They don't really know much about movies. They don't know the history. They don't know the technology. They don't know anything. So for them to try to analyze it, they're lost.”

Knows Trying Lost Technology Critics Illiterate

Author:George Lucas

“There are a lot of movies that are badly made that I love, and there are a lot of movies that are just beautifully made but I don't like them. And critics have a tendency - that's all they focus on, which is, "I like it. I don't like it. It's good. It's bad."”

Made Focus Critics Tendencies

Author:George Lucas

“You're not going to stay in business, the business of making movies very long because you need the resources in order to keep going. So you have to try and find a niche audience or some kind of audience that has the same likes, dislikes and aesthetic sensibilities that you have.”

Needs Trying Kind Long Order Audience Resources Likes Keep Going Dislike Aesthetic Sensibility Niche

Author:George Lucas

“I think one of the reasons that Steven (Spielberg) and I have been as successful as we have is because we like the movies. We like to go to the movies. We enjoy movies and we want to make movies like the ones we enjoy.”

Thinking Want Has Beens Reason Enjoy Successful

Author:George Lucas

“You want people to think. You want people to be emotionally moved. And there's a theory behind that in terms of storytelling. It has been around for thousands of years. And that's where something like live theater or a live performance is something that is very valuable because you get instant feedback from your audience and you kind of know the things that work and the things that don't work.”

People Thinking Knows Want Years Kind Has Beens Term Behinds Audience Theory Performances Theater Moved Valuable Storytelling Instant Feedback Live Performance Live Theater

Author:George Lucas

“I don't ever see movies by myself. I always see them with other people because I want to know what works. I want to know where they laugh. I want to know where they don't laugh. I want to know what they think about it afterwards because in the end that's what the art that I'm working with is.”

People Thinking Knows Want Art Ends Laughing

Author:George Lucas

“People look at technology as sometimes an end to things, and it isn't an end in certain cases. In the movie business, the act of creating in the art form of movies, the craft of movies is completely technical, and that's all it is.”

People Looks Art Ends Sometimes Form Certain Cases Technology Creating Crafts Movie Business

Author:George Lucas

“The first movies, they just put up a camera and had a train come into a train station, and everybody was amazed. That was sort of all technology.”

Firsts Technology Cameras Train Stations Amazed Train Stations

Author:George Lucas

“My life is making movies. I like storytelling, and I've got a lot of stories that are stored up in my head that I hope to get out before my time is up.”

Stories Life Is Storytelling My Time

Author:George Lucas

“I've always just followed my own course, whatever I found the most interesting to me at the moment. I've never had a real plan of, "I want to get from here to there, and I've got to do this."”

Want Real Moments Courses Found My Own Interesting Plans Most Interesting

Author:George Lucas

“I'd like to see education play a larger role in our daily lives, have people come to a larger understanding - a "bigger picture" understanding - of how we fit into the world, and how we fit into the universe. Not necessarily thinking of ourselves, but thinking of others.”

People Thinking World Play Universe Understanding Roles Fit Bigger Daily Life Bigger Picture Thinking Of Others

Author:George Lucas

“I would like to see our society mature, and become more rational and more knowledge-based, less emotion-based.”

Emotion Rational Our Society Mature More Knowledge

Author:George Lucas

“Obviously, people have a lot of different dreams of where America should be, and where it should fit into things. Obviously, very few of them are compatible, and very few of them are very compatible with the laws of nature.”

People Should Different Dream America Law Fit Laws Of Nature Compatible

Author:George Lucas

“Human nature means battling constantly between being completely self-absorbed and trying to be a communal creature. Nature makes you a communal creature. The ultimate single-minded, self-centered creature is a cancer cell. And mostly, we're not made up of cancer cells.”

Trying Humans Mean Made Self Human Nature Creatures Ultimate Cancer Cells Self Centered Self Absorbed

Author:George Lucas

“You have to understand that it's a very cooperative world, not only with the environment, with but our fellow human beings. If you do not cooperate, if you do not work together to keep the entire organism going, the whole thing dies, and everybody dies with it. That's a law of nature, and it's existed forever. We're one of the very few creatures that has a choice, and can intellectualize the process.”

Ifs World Humans Whole Together Law Dies Choices Process Human Beings Forever Environment Creatures Fellows Working Together Organisms Laws Of Nature Cooperatives

Author:George Lucas

About the Author

Born: May 14, 1944
Known for: Film director
Quotes: 268

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Books & Sources

A New Hope: Star Wars: Episode IVRelated source material

Star Wars®: Episode I: The Phantom MenaceRelated source material

ArtFolds: Yoda: Yoda and the ForceRelated source material

George Lucas: InterviewsRelated source material

Star Wars: A New HopeRelated source material

Revenge of the Sith: Illustrated Screenplay: Star Wars: Episode IIIRelated source material

Star Wars®: Episode IV: A New HopeRelated source material

The Star Wars trilogyRelated source material

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