Paul Haggis Quotes

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Paul Haggis

Profession : Director

Birth : March 10, 1953

'Crash' came from personal experience. I saw things inside me from living in L.A. that made me uncomfortable. I saw horrible things in people and saw terrible things in myself. I saw a black director completely humiliated, but the three people around me just thought it was funny. 'No,' I said, 'that is selling your soul.'

Paul Haggis

For me, the most interesting people are ones who often work against their best interests. Bad choices. They go in directions where you go, 'No no no nooo!' You push away someone who is trying to love you, you hurt someone who's trying to get your trust, or you love someone you shouldn't.

Paul Haggis

The wonderful thing about Clint is you can never second guess how he is going to react to anything.

Paul Haggis

I just asked myself, what piece of that man's soul did he just chew off and swallow to get next week's assignment? You know, just to live, just to work as an artist, or to feed the family?

Paul Haggis

I don't think it's the job of filmmakers to give anybody answers. I do think, though, that a good film makes you ask questions of yourself as you leave the theatre.

Paul Haggis

I like to write about things about which I have no answers, questions that trouble me. These things trouble me.

Paul Haggis

Unless I'm really uneasy with what I'm writing, I lose interest very quickly.

Paul Haggis

I miss my mother very, very much.

Paul Haggis

As a general rule, I don't plan to travel with my Oscars, but we may have to make an exception.

Paul Haggis

I was trying to talk about where we are right now as a society, and talk about the fear we all live in, and certainly since 9-11, how it's affected us and the world.

Paul Haggis

We all have these tendencies in us that could go this way or that. I think that's the real key in writing. To look at a character without judgment.

Paul Haggis

We give you characters we'd feel very comfortable judging, and then go: 'Oh yeah? Watch this'.

Paul Haggis

We're trying to reinvent Bond. He's 28 - no Q, no gadgets.

Paul Haggis

'Crash' was incredibly personal to me. So was 'In the Valley of Elah.' There were things in 'The Next Three Days' that were questions I was asking myself but couldn't answer, like how far would you go for love? Can you believe in somebody who can't even believe in themselves? But this is highly personal.

Paul Haggis

I loved American filmmakers when I was growing up. I didn't get to film school or anything. I was a very bad student. I just devoured film, but there was a point in my teens when I started to run a little film society.

Paul Haggis

I don't know how much credit I can take for 'Walker, Texas Ranger,' because I only worked on it for three weeks. I re-wrote the pilot, and then my name was on it forever.

Paul Haggis

When I discovered European filmmakers, it affected me so deeply. It redefined what cinema could be. I mean, 'Blow-Up' ends with a dead body and mimes playing tennis. What?

Paul Haggis

I just figure if you have a modicum of celebrity, you need to use it, and you need to use it for more things than just promoting yourself or your film or your image or your product.

Paul Haggis

I made a very good living as a bad writer. I wrote a lot of comedies, 'Diff'rent Strokes,' 'Facts of Life,' while all my friends were doing the good shows, like 'Cheers,' but I loved it because I got to be a working writer in Hollywood.

Paul Haggis

I wrote an episode for 'thirtysomething,' and a producer said, 'That's really good, but what is it about? What does it say about you? What questions are you asking yourself?' I had never thought about that. This comment changed who I was, because it made me look at my own soul, the dark corners in my soul, and accept that dark side.

Paul Haggis