19 Quotes by Peter Biskind

It was hard to know what to make of the brothers' dark infatuation with death. It was strange, wildly anomalous in sun-baked Southern California, where the light is so bright it bleaches the shadows.

In order to get [Mean Streets] made I had to learn how to make a movie," says Scorsese. "I didn't learn how to make a movie in film school. What you learned in film school was to express yourself with pictures and sound. But learning to make a movie is totally different.

It was a sleepy gathering, not yet the make-or-break event for filmmakers that it would become, The festival was regarded by many distributors as toxic.

And he has guts, ... Most companies would have pulled the plug on 'Cold Mountain' after MGM pulled out, but he went ahead.

'Perfectionist' is the scariest word on a studio lot.

I regard posterity as vulgar as success. I don't trust posterity. I don't think what's good is necessarily recognized in the long run. Too many good writers have disappeared.

It's absolutely impossible to have a serious critical discussion about enthusiasms for movie stars. Because a movie star is an animal separate from acting. Sometimes, he or she is a great actor. Sometimes a third-rate one. But the star is something that you fall in love with ...

I cannot, in my old age, live off pieces of my youth.

I have all the equipment to be a politician. Total shamelessness. But it's lucky I never ran. In the years from [Joseph] McCarthy to now, I would have either been destroyed or reduced.