Jack Valenti Quotes:

The VCR is to the American film producer, as the Boston Strangler is to the woman home alone.

Topics: Home, Boston, Vcr, American Film

Film-makers must decide what story to tell and how to tell it.

Topics: Stories, Film, Makers

Washington and Hollywood spring from the same DNA.

Topics: Spring, Dna, Hollywood

It is called the First Amendment. ...Simple words marching in seried ranks. Compact, concise. To the point. Clear and pure. It's freedom's music.

Topics: Simple, Firsts, Censorship, Compact, Concise

To many Congressmen and Senators right now, there's a ceaseless antagonism toward Hollywood because politically, it is high-reward and low-risk. So when you can't do anything about poverty or the budget deficit, and you can't deal with Bosnia or the possibility of nuclear explosions in Russia, what do you do? You bash Hollywood and get on the front pages.

source: - "Public Endorses Uplifting Movies, Dole Tells Hollywood" by Adam Nagourney, www.nytimes.com. July 31, 1996.

Topics: Russia, Risk, Bosnia, Antagonism, Budget Deficit

The only group in America that deserves to scrutinize what we are doing... are parents.

Topics: America, Parent, Groups, Scrutinize

What is fair use? Fair use is not a law. There's nothing in law.

Topics: Law, Use, In-laws

I sleep each night a little better, a little more confidently, because Lyndon Johnson is my president. For I know he lives and thinks and works to make sure that for all America and indeed, the growing body of the free world, the morning shall always come.

source: - Jack Valenti (2007). “This Time, This Place: My Life in War, the White House, and Hollywood”, p.168, Crown Archetype

Topics: Morning, Sleep, Night, Free World

A huge parasite in the marketplace, feeding and fattening itself off of local television stations and copyright owners of copyrighted material. We do not like it because we think it wrong and unfair.

source: - Jack Valenti's comments on the Cable television industry in testimony to Congress (June 1974), as quoted in "What Jack Valenti Did for Hollywood" by Richard Corliss, content.time.com. April 27, 2007.

Topics: Thinking, Television, Unfair, Fattening

In a political struggle, never get personal - else the dagger digs too deep.

source: - "What Jack Valenti Taught Us All" by Matt Gerson, www.washingtonpost.com. April 28, 2007.

Topics: Struggle, Political, Daggers, Political Struggle, Too Deep

If what you own cannot be protected, you own nothing.

source: - Jack Valenti's testimony as President of the MPAA to the U.S. House of Representatives, cryptome.org. April 12, 1982.

There is no fair use to take something that doesn't belong to you. That's not fair use.

source: - Interview with Peter Rojas, www.engadget.com. August 30, 2004.

Topics: Use, Not Fair

The public's nerves are raw and edgy. You have to be discreet and understanding about the films you are showing.

Topics: Understanding, Nerves, Film, Discreet, Edginess

I sleep each night a little better, a little more confidently, because Lyndon Johnson is my president.

Topics: Sleep, Night, President

If you buy a DVD you have a copy. If you want a backup copy you buy another one.

source: - "DVD-copy program tweaked after court order", CNN.com, February 23, 2004.

Topics: Dvds, Want, Backup

No one today knows what is indecent.

source: - "US TV industry plans June ad campaign on decency". Reuters, April 24, 2006.

Topics: Today

There isn't anything in the world that can't be made better.

Topics: World, Made

Foreign capital to build new cinemas will help modernize China's aging cinema infrastructure, attract Chinese consumers back into cinemas, and increase demand for U.S. films.

Topics: Chinese, Cinema, Demand

Every parent in America has the total power to control all television programming that is dispatched to their home today.

Topics: Home, America, Parent

If movies are causing moral decay, then crime ought to be going up, but crime is going down.

Topics: Decay, Moral, Crime, Moral Decay

I found the most convincing part to be the working stiffs, the guys who have a modest home and kids who go to public schools. They make $75,000 to $100,000 a year. That's not much to live on. I don't have to tell you that.

source: - Entertainment Weekly, April 18, 2003.

Topics: Home, School, Kids

A public domain work is an orphan. No one is responsible for its life. But everyone exploits its use, until that time certain when it becomes soiled and haggard, barren of its previous virtues. How does the consumer benefit from the steady decline of a film's quality?

source: - "A Plea For Keeping Alive the U.S. Film Industry's Competitive Energy". Jack Valenti's speech as MPAA Chairman and CEO before The Senate Judiciary Committee, September 20, 1995.

Topics: Quality, Doe, Use, Haggard, Public Domain

In a sometimes unreasonable business, Jack Valenti was a giant voice of reason. He was the greatest ambassador Hollywood has ever known and I will value his wisdom and friendship for all time.

Topics: Voice, Hollywood, Giants, Wisdom And Friendship, Voice Of Reason

If You Cannot Protect What You Own, You Don’t Own Anything!

source: - Jack Valenti (2007). “This Time, This Place: My Life in War, the White House, and Hollywood”, p.301, Crown Archetype

Topics: Protect, Ifs

I don't care if you call it AO for Adults Only, or Chopped Liver or Father Goose. Your movie will still have the stigma of being in a category that's going to be inhabited by the very worst of pictures.

source: - The New York Times, March 5, 1987.

Topics: Movie, Father, Adults, Chopped Liver