| The Quotable Paul Verhoeven | |||||
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| Paul Verhoeven Quotes |
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| People seem to have this strange idea that films can influence people to be violent, but in my sincere opinion film only reflects the violence of society As a director, my goal is to be completely open. Just look at how I portray sex in my films. They're considered shocking and obscene because I like to carefully examine human sexuality. It has to be realistic. I really like documentaries, therefore, reality is important to me when I do fiction. It is often related to my own life, my Dutch background. The art scene in Holland has always attempted to be realistic. The Dutch painters of 400 years ago were meticulously realistic. The example I always like to use is a marvelous painting by Hieronymus Bosch titled "The Prodigal Son". It is a painting of a brothel, and in the corner is a man pissing against a wall. You would never, never find something like that in an Italian, French or English painting of that epoch. The Dutch have always been more scientific, interested in detail; certainly less idealistic and more realistic. The sex scenes in De vierde man (1983) ["The Fourth Man"] and Turks fruit (1973) {"Turkish Delight"] were based on real experiences I had or a friend had. It's very personal. Of course, I must admit that I love to shock audiences. De vierde man (1983) [["The Fourth Man"] has to do with my vision of religion. In my opinion, Christianity is nothing more than one of many interpretations of reality, neither more nor less. Ideally, it would be nice to believe that there is a God somewhere out there, but it looks to me as if the whole Christian religion is a major symptom of schizophrenia in half the world's population: civilizations scrambling to rationalize their chaotic existence. Subsequently, Christianity has a tendency to look like magic or the occult. And I liked that ambiguity, because I wanted my audience to take something home with them. I wanted them to wonder about what religion really is. Remember that Christianity is a religion grounded in one of the most violent acts of murder, the crucifixion. Otherwise, religion wouldn't have had any kind of impact. With regards to the irony of the violence, much of that probably comes from my childhood experiences during and immediately following the Second World War. In fact, if it hadn't been for the German occupation and then the American occupation, I would have never been a filmmaker. The sooner we admit our capacity for evil the less apt we are to destroy each other. People love seeing violence and horrible things. The human being is bad and he can't stand more than five minutes of happiness. Put him in a dark theater and ask him to look at two hours of happiness and he'd walk out or fall asleep. [on his Total Recall (1990) star and good friend Arnold Schwarzenegger] Arnold has no ego. You can say anything to him. In fact, during his first day on the set [of "Total Recall] he sat me down and told me, "I won't be offended if you talk to me in a direct manner. Say what you feel". That made it easy, because I wouldn't have to be diplomatic and say, "Arnold, could you perhaps move over here and give me a different angle?" I could just go, "Arnold, this is bad. You look stupid!" It's still difficult if you are a European director and your first language is not English to be exactly aware what the nuances of the American language are. Even after fifty, sixty years you are basically kind of a little bit retarded there. [On his filmmaking style] American critics always complain about the blandness of mainstream movies, but when you do something more ambiguous and ironic, they are pissed off too. I like putting certain aspects of American society under the magnifying glass and showing them for what they are. There is a fear about sex in motion pictures, as if sex would undermine morality. |
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