Paul Haggis Quotes

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Paul Haggis

Profession : Director

Birth : March 10, 1953

I don't know if 'Crash' is a good movie or not because I didn't set out to make a movie. Really, what I wanted to do is more of a social experiment.

Paul Haggis

I thought 'The King's Speech' was great.

Paul Haggis

I have never pretended to be the best Scientologist, but I openly and vigorously defended the church whenever it was criticized, as I railed against the kind of intolerance that I believed was directed against it. I had my disagreements, but I dealt with them internally.

Paul Haggis

I don't think I'm against all wars, but you'd have to have a damn good reason to send your son or daughter to fight, or to go yourself. So often, we are lied to and manipulated by our governments for their own very cynical reasons.

Paul Haggis

You don't make a film because the audience is ready for it. You make a film because you have questions that are in your gut.

Paul Haggis

My one guiding rule for success in the film world would be, be careful of your friends.

Paul Haggis

I moved to Hollywood when I was 22. I was married. I had a kid right away. And I had worked as a furniture mover amongst various other jobs, and I'd work eight, ten hours a day to support my family - and I'd come home and write for two hours a night or two and a half, or three hours a night.

Paul Haggis

All my work is partly biographical. I mean, 'Crash' was absolutely that, absolutely. But you just wouldn't recognize me in most of those characters. But I was in every single one of those characters in 'Crash,' because those were all fears that I had felt. Things that I had thought in my deepest, darkest heart.

Paul Haggis

In 'The Next Three Days,' even though it was a prison breakout movie, I was asking myself, 'What would I do? How far would I go for the woman I loved? How far would I go, and what would I do when the person then told me that they were guilty? Could I still believe in them?' So it was very personal.

Paul Haggis

A lot of films made me love the movies, everything from Hitchcock to Godard. But the ones that really grabbed me were Costa-Gavras's films like 'Z' and 'State of Siege.'

Paul Haggis

The worst thing you can do to a filmmaker is to walk out of his film and go, 'That was a nice movie.' But if you can cause people to walk out and then argue about the film on the sidewalk... I think we're all seeking dissension, and we love to affect an audience.

Paul Haggis

As artists, we have to be brave. If we aren't brave, we aren't artists.

Paul Haggis