Nicolas Winding Refn Quotes

Like all art forms, film is a media as powerful as weapons of mass destruction; the only difference is that war destroys and film inspires.

I don't believe that art makes people violent in any way. I don't. But I do believe art can show people how to be violent and that's much more dangerous in a way.

I think that I am a pornographer, meaning that I make movies based on what excites me and what I would like to see.

The artificial world that we create through images will essentially become real.

Cinema is mass media, it is both overtly gross and exciting. It is our great mirror of society.

Creativity is narcissism. Creativity is falling in love with one's self as you create. It's self-indulgent.

In a way, art is a great way to release your love, fantasy, and desires. It's like a fetish. It's a comfortable way of excising a lot of your conscience.

Look at the birth of anything; it's always more violent than anything you could ever imagine.

We live in a beauty-obsessed culture, which on one hand is absolutely fabulous, but on the flip side, is also dangerously extreme.

The world needs change, change needs an activity. It has to be planted by a thought.

The idea of narcissism, essentially, is and will be accepted as a virtue.

Understanding one's own power is more interesting than someone being given something powerful.

You must understand that violence in a movie is only a tool. If it's used badly, it will be horrible. If it's used correctly, it can be very interesting. But, essentially, it's just a tool.

I wanted to make a horror film about beauty.

Reaction is what changes your understanding of the world.

[The Neon Demon] was more my own fascination with beauty. It's my children's fascination beauty.

I love films, I love movies, I love television, I love television series, I love the internet, I love anything that enhances images. But most of all, I love, love movies.

I also believe on a practical level, if you're taking time away from people, besides entertaining them, I think it's important that there's something to react to.

That's half of what we do our daily lives - we react to our surroundings. Of course, we have to make it entertaining, and we are entertainers.

I never desired to really go to Hollywood and make films, and purely because I want my entire control, which I'm used to having.

I always think once you have the lead protagonist, you cast around that character.

Only God Forgives was very much a generation gap in a way. It was all the youth of the world that embraced it. I make films for young people. That's what I will continue to do.

The fairy tale always takes place in worlds that are between, unidentifiable.

The future is not about what you do, it's about what you stand for.

I don't have to go very far to see the power of beauty. Being desired, feeling desired is a very seductive aspect of our being.

Man's fear of sexuality is the basis of all horror from the male perspective.

For me, Amazon has stepped in and presented the future of entertainment. Obviously, the future of entertainment is going to be on the internet.

I love watching the superhero movies and I would love to make one.

I think when you make a movie, one of your main focuses as a director is to inspire everyone else to give their best. Like manipulation.

I think that experiencing through art is a wonderful way to expand the horizon and everything around it.

I love rock ballads, and I'm kind of in emotional turmoil, being ill and high, so I start to sing to the song, I turn it up and start to sing.

I've been trying to get away from physical violence; it's too easy; it doesn't satisfy me artistically to work with it. Dramatic violence is much more interesting, but it's much more difficult.

I consider it a great honour that my movie Drive inspired so many wonderful artists to come together and create one ultra-cool glam experience.

I'm a fetishist. I make films based on what I would like to see.

I don't do drugs, and so music very much gets me going. When I do something, I think, "If it was a piece of music, what would it be?"

Financially, it was very successful. Which is the most important thing. That is the only way you get to make another movie. It's very simple. The market will value you.

I'm a very feminine man. I like feminine things. I don't go to strip clubs. I don't drink beer. I don't play sports.

The more we become civilized, the more we simultaneously understand our need to be virtuous, and our need to understand our experiences on a subconscious level.

Abbey Lee was a very famous model and had great success. She was very open about the negative aspects of that industry.

Doing your first film, it's very important that it's a commercial success, because that gives you a couple times to experiment until you have to hit the jackpot again.

Creativity is very self-indulgent.

There's incredible effect in being either loved or hated, but knowing that, either way, you have penetrated the mind and have altered it; that is a very pleasurable feeling.

Love comes from the strangest places.

It was a very comfortable and personal relationship [Cliff Martinez ].'The Neon Demon'is our third movie and the music has never been as important as for this movie.

Jenna Malone was a very important piece of how the film [The Neon Demon] turned out.

Elle Fanning was fifteen when we started [The Neon Demon]. She turned seventeen during the shoot. Four weeks before Cannes, she turned eighteen. She had her prom at Cannes.

I think that Danish people may be thought off as the happiest people, but honestly...I love America.

I feel Amazon is really bringing films into the future. So for me it was the best of both worlds.

If the Wizard of Oz were real he would be in Hollywood.

Ironically, even the fashion in New York or Paris or Milan or whatever, or music in Berlin, or art in, I don't know, Madrid - all these scenes come and go. Everything leads back to Hollywood.