Viggo Mortensen Quotes

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Viggo Mortensen

Profession : Actor

Birth : October 20, 1958

You do need to get lucky, no matter how talented you are.

Viggo Mortensen

If you don't find some way to discuss what's going on inside you, it can come out in other ways that are self-destructive.

Viggo Mortensen

It's very rare you get a great script just handed to you, or sent to you, by someone you don't know.

Viggo Mortensen

I think every family is dysfunctional, and some manage to control it better than others.

Viggo Mortensen

In the end, the actor's main power is the power to say, 'No.'

Viggo Mortensen

Adult characters are all the things they've encountered over time. But kids haven't accumulated all the life experience, all the regrets. They tend to be more in the moment, more willing to play, to be joyful.

Viggo Mortensen

I was raised speaking English and Spanish. And I also speak Danish. And I can get by in French and Italian. I've acted in Spanish and English, but when something has to do with emotions, sometimes I feel I can get to the heart of the matter better in Spanish.

Viggo Mortensen

In a way, editing is not unlike the movies. The best books, just like the best movies, are a collaboration. They're only as good as the compromise made between the artists involved.

Viggo Mortensen

In terms of the movie business, being in a 'Lord of the Rings' has given me more interesting options as work.

Viggo Mortensen

You can't really divorce yourself and your life from the world you live in.

Viggo Mortensen

Looking at acting, in the movies or the theater, and the way I like to look at it, it's just an extension of childhood play... Kids play and imagine in a very intense fashion and they don't need any director telling them, 'You really have to believe in it.' They believe in it completely.

Viggo Mortensen

I mean, any movie or story that makes you accept and be grateful for something about your life is doing something right.

Viggo Mortensen

Toronto Film Festival is one of those festivals where there are 400 movies, and unless you have a distributor who is super confident and puts a lot of money into it, sometimes movies can go unwatched or unnoticed.

Viggo Mortensen

I like movies that leave you with something to think about, to discuss, to debate, you know?

Viggo Mortensen

I'm sort of contrary and stubborn sometimes. When everybody says, 'You have to read this book! You have to read this book!' I'm like 'Oh, I'll get around to it.'

Viggo Mortensen

I'm optimistic about people and about the planet and about nature. I think it's resilient, like people are.

Viggo Mortensen

Kids accept where they are because they don't know the past. They know what they have; they know where they are.

Viggo Mortensen

With few exceptions, one ought always do what one is afraid of.

Viggo Mortensen

You know, 'Viggo' is a pretty dorky name in Denmark. It's like 'Oswald' or something. It's a very old Scandinavian name, at least 1,000 years old.

Viggo Mortensen

I like naturally occurring film grain, and what happens to film when it's under- and over-exposed.

Viggo Mortensen