Quotes

We are in the transportation business. We transport audiences from one place to another.

If I made films for the critics, or for someone else, I'd probably be living in some small Hollywood studio apartment.

Every time I make a movie I think that it's going to be my last one, I think that no one is going to show up. I always have this sense that they're all going to fail. I am scared to death.

I think that there's a certain synchronicity, so far, with what I like and with what the audiences like. But I don't make the movies for them. I make them because I wanna go see them myself.

Top Gun (1986) is no different from Pirates of the Caribbean - in fact, they're very similar because both movies were working in genres that were dead. Fighter pilot movies had all failed and pirate movies had been dead for a long time. We approached them from a different angle.

I was always looking to be entertained. We lead such full lives and a lot of us don't lead very pleasant lives and don't like what we do... My dad worked his whole life as a salesman and that wasn't what he really wanted to do. He looked forward to two weeks vacation every year and he used to say to me, 'Whatever you do, make sure you do something you really like so you don't just have your vacation to look forward to.' And I love movies.

I think my success stems from one fear ... fear of failure.

I don't consider what I do work - when comparing it to the way my father made his living. He was on his feet all day long.

[on the disappointing public response to Lone Ranger : Naissance d'un héros (2013)] It reminds me of a critic who called Flashdance (1983) a "toxic dump". I think "The Lone Ranger" is going to be looked back on as a brave, wonderful film.

[on being interested in producing short-form content for mobile devices] We come across ideas every day that don't hold up to the scrutiny of something that is a half hour or an hour, so [short-form] is a great place to put that kind of content. [July 2017]