65 Quotes by Niki Caro

When I was starting out I was way too scared to ask real directors how to do it or ask for advice, I'm really kind of New Zealand like that.

I don't see myself as a crusading feminist filmmaker. Not at all. I have the luxury of coming from New Zealand and I've had moments in my life where being female is considered to be a tremendous advantage - emotionally, career-wise.

The Maori culture is different than our culture where we're most likely to introduce ourselves by email or fax and we conduct a lot of business in an impersonal way, whereas for Maori, the only way to do it is to make the pilgrimage and sit down face-to-face and have some tea.

Fundamentally, the way I work is exactly the same whether I'm making 'Whale Rider' or 'Mulan'. And those two stories are somewhat similar. They have interesting parallels, and it felt like I'd really come full circle, back to a story of leadership.

I was always stealing 40-gallon drums off the road at night, bringing them back to the workshop and cutting them up with a gas axe because I loved to weld. I would make creatures out of these old metal drums.

I take particular care in authenticity and specificity when working in cultures not my own. Every aspect of the filmmaking here was meticulously researched, and not just by me but across every department.

I'm primarily interested in examining human issues.

You know, when you make something in live-action, you make it real. And when you are inspired by and determined to honor the original - the most original version of the 'Mulan' story - then you have to acknowledge that this is a story about a young woman who disguises herself as a man and goes to war.

Martial arts are inherently both incredibly impressive and incredibly beautiful. And that's my female nature, maybe, and my instinct, to make things beautiful.