Michael Arndt famous quotes

03-23-2025

I like to begin every screenplay with a burst of delusional self-confidence. It tends to fade pretty quickly, but (for me, at least) there doesn't seem to be any other way to start writing a script.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Self Confidence #Way
In live-action, writing, production, and editing happen in discrete stages. In animation, they overlap - happening simultaneously. This allows a real dialogue to occur between the writer, the director, the actors, and the editor, and it makes the writing process a lot more collaborative and a lot less lonely.
-- Michael Arndt

#Lonely #Real #Writing
In terms of writing characters or stories, at least initially, there's no difference between live-action and animation. A good story is a good story, whatever the medium.
-- Michael Arndt

#Character #Writing #Differences
I can write two scripts concurrently, but I usually prefer to do one at a time. However, I also usually have 5 or 6 story ideas that are percolating in my head at any one time, so it can get a little crowded in there.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Ideas #Two
A good story is a good story, whatever the medium.
-- Michael Arndt

#Stories #Mediums
One of my favorite films is LATE SPRING by Yasujiro Ozu. To me, it represents film as art.
-- Michael Arndt

#Art #Spring #Film
My God, there are so many mediocre screenplays out there.
-- Michael Arndt

#Mediocre #Screenplays
The best writing really does come from the deepest, most private part of you.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Doe #Private Parts
Working at Pixar has been like my graduate school for screenwriting.
-- Michael Arndt

#School #Graduates #Pixar
Writing a great script - not just a good one, but a great one - is almost an impossible task.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Scripts #Tasks
If you write a bunch of different characters with a bunch of different opinions, you end up with these long scenes of everyone standing around talking.
-- Michael Arndt

#Character #Writing #Talking
You never want your second act or the whole movie to just be this relentless march towards its goal. You want things to take the audience by surprise.
-- Michael Arndt

#Goal #Want #March
The number one metaphor I have in my mind for writing a screenplay is that...you're trying to climb a mountain blindfolded. And the funny thing about that is, you think, 'Okay, that's hard because you're climbing up a rock face, and you don't know where you're going, and you don't know where the top is, you can't see what's below you...' But actually the hardest part about climbing a mountain blindfolded is just finding the mountain.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Thinking #Rocks
Good writing is deceptive in that it hides its own artifice - it makes it seem easy.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Easy #Deceptive
My thing is that most scripts arent bad scripts, theyre just not finished yet.
-- Michael Arndt

#Scripts
All thought is created, therefore we are all creators of whatever world we live in.
-- Michael Arndt

#Self Improvement #World #Improvement
Changing how you think costs you no money and it takes no special talent. It does take a commitment on your part to be different.
-- Michael Arndt

#Commitment #Thinking #Self Improvement
Every problem offers an opportunity for a solution. if you are in the right frame of mind to find it.
-- Michael Arndt

#Opportunity #Mind #Self Improvement
Failure can only exist from stagnant perceptions. Everything is a process of learning and if you learn something useful, you have success.
-- Michael Arndt

#Perception #Self Improvement #Process
If you only know something one way, then you don't really know it.
-- Michael Arndt

#Self Improvement #Way #Improvement
Line up your thoughts up for potential, take action and success will follow.
-- Michael Arndt

#Self Improvement #Lines #Action
The fluidity of thought is based on the flexibility of beliefs and the emotional boundaries surrounding them.
-- Michael Arndt

#Emotional #Self Improvement #Fluidity
The way you think either stands in your way or assists you in achieving your goals.
-- Michael Arndt

#Thinking #Goal #Self Improvement
We have the freedom to excel or inhibit our potential. You are the grand designer of your thoughts and emotions. At some level or another you are the one who chooses which thoughts to accept and which ones to ignore. That can be a very empower realization.
-- Michael Arndt

#Empowering #Self Improvement #Realization
Who you think you are is only a thought.
-- Michael Arndt

#Thinking #Self Improvement #Improvement
I had read enough mediocre scripts and was determined not to inflict another one on the world.
-- Michael Arndt

#Scripts #World #Determined
I figured Iâ€™d probably write 50 scripts in my life. Out of those 50, I figured maybe five would be produced, and that maybe one or two would be successful. So I always kind of expected Iâ€™d write at least one successful film in my life. [...] The way it all came together was kind of like Murphy's law in reverseâ€”I donâ€™t expect that kind of experience again any time soon.
-- Michael Arndt

#Writing #Successful #Law
Adversity challenges the masks we hide behind, revealing sides of ourselves we have not yet comfortably with the world outside. It is why we dislike adversity, because we have to face what we don't yet understand about ourselves.
-- Michael Arndt

#Adversity #Challenges #Self Improvement

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