30 Best Stanley Kubrick Quotes

The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent. – Stanley Kubrick

However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light. – Stanley Kubrick

The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes. – Stanley Kubrick

The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning. – Stanley Kubrick

If it can be written, or thought, it can be filmed. – Stanley Kubrick

A film is - or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. – Stanley Kubrick

When a man cannot choose, he ceases to be a man. – Stanley Kubrick

You cannot make a movie without a very good script. The script is the foundation of the film. – Stanley Kubrick

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. – Stanley Kubrick

I think the big mistake in schools is trying to teach children anything, and by using fear as the basic motivation. Fear of getting failing grades, fear of not staying with your class, etc. Interest can produce learning on a scale compared to fear as a nuclear explosion to a firecracker. – Stanley Kubrick

I have always enjoyed dealing with a slightly surrealistic situation and presenting it in a realistic manner. – Stanley Kubrick

The screen is a magic medium. It has such power that it can retain interest as it conveys emotions and moods that no other art form can hope to tackle. – Stanley Kubrick

Perhaps it sounds ridiculous, but the best thing that young filmmakers should do is to get hold of a camera and some film and make a movie of any kind at all. – Stanley Kubrick

I never learned anything at all in school and didn't read a book for pleasure until I was 19 years old. – Stanley Kubrick

The most perfect world is the one that doesn't exist. That's the one we're trying to get to. – Stanley Kubrick

In most of the films now, you don't get a chance to be bored. The moment it seems to be getting a little slow, they cut to something else. I think that's a mistake. – Stanley Kubrick

A film has to be a series of still photographs. That's film. – Stanley Kubrick

How could we possibly appreciate the Mona Lisa if Leonardo had written at the bottom of the canvas: 'The lady is smiling because she is hiding a secret from her lover'? This would shackle the viewer to reality, and I don't want this to happen to my films. – Stanley Kubrick

The truth of a thing is in the feel of it, not the think of it. – Stanley Kubrick

I like slow-paced films. I like the slow start, the gradual build-up, and then the rapid descent. – Stanley Kubrick

I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first. – Stanley Kubrick

The most overrated quality in filmmaking is originality. – Stanley Kubrick

If you can talk brilliantly about a problem, it can create the consoling illusion that it has been mastered. – Stanley Kubrick

The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder. – Stanley Kubrick

I do not always know what I want, but I do know what I don't want. – Stanley Kubrick

All you can do is fantasize that you're going to do the most incredible movie anyone has ever seen, and then you try to make it. – Stanley Kubrick

A film is a visual medium, and you must tell the story with pictures. – Stanley Kubrick

I have a son and a daughter and four grandchildren, and I'm not interested in abstractions. I'm interested in my relationship with them. – Stanley Kubrick

The best way to learn about film is to make one. – Stanley Kubrick

I never learned anything while I was talking. – Stanley Kubrick