I love making pictures but I don't like talking about them.
Anybody can direct a picture once they know the fundamentals. Directing is not a mystery, it's not an art. The main thing about directing is: photograph the people's eyes.
It is easier to get an actor to be a cowboy than to get a cowboy to be an actor.
It's no use talking to me about art, I make pictures to pay the rent.
I didn't show up at the ceremony to collect any of my first three Oscars. Once I went fishing, another time there was a war on, and on another occasion, I remember, I was suddenly taken drunk.
For a director there are commercial rules that it is necessary to obey. In our profession, an artistic failure is nothing; a commercial failure is a sentence. The secret is to make films that please the public and also allow the director to reveal his personality.
[On John Wayne] Duke is the best actor in Hollywood.
As a beauty, Dolores del Rio is in a class with [Greta Garbo]. Then she opens her mouth and becomes Minnie Mouse.
My name is John Ford and I make Westerns.
[in 1967] I am a liberal Democrat and a rebel.
[on Native American Indians] We've treated them badly, it's a blot on our shield; we've robbed, cheated, murdered and massacred them, but they kill one white man and God, out come the troops.
(about the CinemaScope anamorphic aspect ratio) I hated it. You've never seen a painter use that kind of composition - even the great murals, it still wasn't this huge tennis court. Your eyes pop back and forth, and it's very difficult to get a close-up.
