Martin Scorsese quotes

“What the Dalai Lama had to resolve was whether to stay in Tibet or leave. He wanted to stay, but staying would have meant the total destruction of Tibet, because he would have died and that would have ripped the heart out of his people.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I do know that some Buddhists are able to attain peace of mind.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I still dislike phones, yeah!”

— Martin Scorsese

“There was always a part of me that wanted to be an old-time director. But I couldn't do that. I'm not a pro.”

— Martin Scorsese

“People say you should do it this way, someone else suggests that, yes, there's financing, but maybe you should use this actor. And there are the threats, at the end - if you don't do it this way, you'll lose your box office; if you don't do it that way, you'll never get financed again... 35, 40 years of this, you get beat up.”

— Martin Scorsese

“As a child I had terrible asthma.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I always say that I've been in a bad mood for maybe 35 years now. I try to lighten it up, but that's what comes out when you get me on camera.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I grew up in the Lower East Side, an Italian American - more Sicilian, actually.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I'm going to be 60, and I'm almost used to myself.”

— Martin Scorsese

“It's hard to let new stuff in. And whether that admits a weakness, I don't know.”

— Martin Scorsese

“On every film you suffer, but on some you really suffer.”

— Martin Scorsese

“You gotta understand, when moving images first started, people wanted sound, color, big screen and depth.”

— Martin Scorsese

“You make a deal. You figure out how much sin you can live with.”

— Martin Scorsese

“You never know how much time you have left.”

— Martin Scorsese

“Zombies, what are you going to do with them? Just keep chopping them up, shooting at them, shooting at them.”

— Martin Scorsese

“If we just sit and exist, and understand that, I think it will be helpful in a world that seems like a record that's going faster and faster, we're spinning off the edge of the universe.”

— Martin Scorsese

“If it's a modern-day story dealing with certain ethnic groups, I think I could open up certain scenes for improvisation, while staying within the structure of the script.”

— Martin Scorsese

“Can a film really change anything? I mean, what was the last time? Maybe the Italian neo-realists, where they became the voice and the heart and the soul of Italy, a nation that had been destroyed. I don't know.”

— Martin Scorsese

“Every year or so, I try to do something; it keeps me refreshed as to what's going on in front of the lens, and I understand what the actor is going through.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I think when you're young and have that first burst of energy and make five or six pictures in a row that tell the stories of all the things in life you want to say... well, maybe those are the films that should have won me the Oscar.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I'm sad to see celluloid go, there's no doubt. But, you know, nitrate went, by the way, in 1971. If you ever saw a nitrate print of a silent film and then saw an acetate print, you'd see a big difference, but nobody remembers anymore. The acetate print is what we have. Maybe. Now it's digital.”

— Martin Scorsese

“When I'm making a film, I'm the audience.”

— Martin Scorsese

“My whole life has been movies and religion. That's it. Nothing else.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I love the look of planes and the idea of how a plane flies. The more I learn about it the better I feel; while I still may not like it, I have a sense of what is really happening.”

— Martin Scorsese

“It's interesting that these themes of crime and political corruption are always relevant.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I also saw the Dalai Lama a few times.”

— Martin Scorsese

“There are times when you have to face your enemies, sit down and deal with it.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I'd like to do a number of films. Westerns. Genre pieces. Maybe another film about Italian Americans where they're not gangsters, just to prove that not all Italians are gangsters.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I go through periods, usually when I'm editing and shooting, of seeing only old films.”

— Martin Scorsese

“I just wanted to be an ordinary parish priest.”

— Martin Scorsese