I dont feel despair because I am able to make the films I want to make, and that gives me hope. – Alexander Payne
Hollywood films have become a cesspool of formula and its up to us to try to change it… I feel like a preacher! But its really true. I feel personally responsible for the future of American cinema. Me personally. – Alexander Payne
I get asked, How can you have such failures in your films? Well, what else is life about? Theres some sense of constant failure in something. Humor gives you a distance from it. – Alexander Payne
I guess maybe I try to make movies that are closer to real life than are many Hollywood movies. But I still try to stay within a commercial narrative, a contemporary American vernacular. – Alexander Payne
One of the big questions in the climate change debate: Are humans any smarter than frogs in a pot? If you put a frog in a pot and slowly turn up the heat, it wont jump out. Instead, it will enjoy the nice warm bath until it is cooked to death. We humans seem to be doing pretty much the same thing. – Jeff Goodell