Nicolas cage quotes

I always see America as really belonging to the Native Americans. Even though I'm American, I still feel like a visitor in my own country.

Snakes are sometimes perceived as evil, but they are also perceived as medicine. If you look at an ambulance, there's the two snakes on the side of the ambulance. The caduceus, or the staff of Hermes, there's the two snakes going up it, which means that the venom can also be healing.

It may come as a surprise to people, but I'm actually quite boring and normal. What do I do? I read books. I drive my kid to school. I have lunch with my wife. I pick my kid up from school. I go home.

I'm at the point now where I know I'm doing something right when a movie gets mixed reviews, because then I'm not in the box. I don't want to make it too easy for people and I don't want to make it too easy for myself. I want to try something unusual.

I was always shocked when I went to the doctor's office and they did my X-ray and didn't find that I had eight more ribs than I should have or that my blood was the color green.

My house is basically a trailer. I live a circus lifestyle. I'm always moving. It's not always easy for people that live with me, but that's the path I chose.

I hit the ground running, without a lot of training, so I had to do whatever I could do to survive as a professional, and if that meant being that character 24/7 and acting out, I was going to do that. I lived those characters, I brought them home with me.

Nobody wants to watch perfection.

I believe that everybody has the right to believe what they want to believe and to knock somebody's faith and religion is foolish, whatever it may be - Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism.

When I play supernatural characters in 'Ghost Rider' or 'City Of Angels,' the possibilities are limitless. The possibilities are endless, you can do so much with that.

One of the pluses of getting older is you set some limits.

There's a fine line between the Method actor and the schizophrenic.

Well, good science fiction is intelligent. It asks big questions that are on people's minds. It's not impossible. It has some sort of root in the abstract. So automatically you're getting closer to potentially divine sources of interest because it is abstract. It's one of the only ways that a film actor can express himself in the abstract and have audiences still go along for the ride. They don't contend it. They accept it, that they're going to go places that are a bit more of the imagination, a bit more out there, and that's more and more where I like to dance.

Some things are true whether you believe in them or not.

There are over 550 million firearms in worldwide circulation. That's one firearm for every twelve people on the planet. The only question is, how do we arm the other 11?

You can choose your family sometimes. You can choose people, it could be a teacher, it could be a professor, it could be someone you work with that actually genuinely cares about you and wants you to succeed.

I know what it's like to meet someone you admire and have them be a complete jerk.

I've always maintained that I see myself as a student. There's always something to learn and be challenged by and hopefully grow from.

All of my characters have a glint of madness.

I think that movies can help guide us through those experiences [the problems that are happening in our daily lives, the stresses between countries, the economy and global warming]. I think all art tries to grapple with, redefine, come to terms with, express what's happening now when it's working. You can be entertained, but you can also be stimulated to think about things.

You aren't a true internationalist until you've supplied weapons to kill your own countrymen.

Picasso said art is a lie that tells the truth. What if you just want to tell the truth and not lie about it?

I see myself as a student. I would never call myself a master or a maestro. If you take the path of the student, that means you have to try a little bit of everything in hopes that you're going to learn something or strike some kind of new note, expression in the process. I'm not going for grades; I'm going for an education. I'm going to continue experimenting and trying new things to try to evolve and learn.

There is a misperception, if you will, in critical response or even in Hollywood, that I can only do exaggerated characters. Or what they would call over-the-top performances. Well, this is completely false.

I didn't play the Ghost Rider in the first movie. That was a stuntman. In this film, the Ghost Rider feels much more alive because I did put some thought into how he should walk and into how he should move. I was so into the character, in fact, that I would paint my face with white and black makeup to look like a skull. And I put on blacked-out contact lenses, so I almost looked like an Afro-New Orleanian voodoo icon by the name of Baron Samedi. Oh man, I would walk around the set without saying a word to anybody, and I could see the fear in my co-stars' and co-directors' eyes.

My direction as a person working in film has been to never get comfortable with anything I was doing. At the time that I decided to do action films, people were telling me, "Well, you can't do it. You're not that type. It's not going to work." And so obviously that made me think, "Well, that's not comfortable. Maybe I should try it. What can I do with it?" So I did that, and I'm glad I did it. I'll probably do it again, and I did other kinds of things that seemed like challenges for me, because I like being on the high wire.

I've been lucky to work with some of the most creative people and it's true that I enjoy filmmaking and I'm an enthusiast.

Mike Myers as Austin Powers makes me laugh - that was genius - and Daffy Duck makes me laugh, but I like odd behavior. I don't like hip dialogue and one-liners and all that sort of cool, sophomoric comedy. It's just not for me.

When I was eight, I would look at the cover of the 'Ghost Rider' comic book in my little home in Long Beach, California, and I couldn't get my head around how something that scary could also be good. To me it was my first philosophical awakening - 'How is this possible, this duality?'

I don't think movies are the reason why this violence exists, I think it's going to happen whether movies are there or not.

I think what makes people fascinating is conflict, it's drama, it's the human condition. Nobody wants to watch perfection.

I think it's no secret that I've tried to take chances in my career and also in my life, and I believe to not live in fear.

I think I jump around more when I'm alone.

I like to work with young people, because young people haven’t had their dreams kicked out of them yet. Full of confidence, and imagination, and vision, and when they score that all gets empowered.

The only way the devil really exists in my opinion... is in interactions with people who don't walk the walk and talk the talk; people who act one way, or talk one way and then do another. Those are the deals with the devil. I don't see the devil as somebody who is a horned, goateed guy with a fork in his hand that's there to continuously stab me and send my soul to hell. I don't see it that way at all.

The end of the world is on people's minds. We have the power to destroy or save ourselves, but the question is what do you do with that responsibility.

Every great story seems to begin with a snake.

My best takes are my first two takes.

We've become so glorified in the movie-star system that it's become this artificial royalty. The truth is that we're circus clowns.

There were two movies that asked me to go to Australia or New Zealand for long periods of time. One was 'Lord of the Rings' and one was 'The Matrix.' But I was actively involved at that time raising my family, and I couldn't really take that time out.

I have a love-hate relationship with New Orleans, which is the strongest sort of relationship. I've had some extraordinary, beautiful, poetic experiences in this city and I've had some terrible experiences in this city. I'm drawn to New Orleans, in many ways feel I grew up in New Orleans, even though I'm from the West.

With the advent of this kind of TMZ culture, it sadly seems to have infiltrated the vanguard of film commentary. I see these reviews sometimes where I think, well, you have a right to say whatever you want about my work, and I will listen whether it's good or bad and see if there's something that I might work with, but personal issues don't have a place in film commentary.

We do see Gong Li, Zhang Ziyi and Chow Yun Fat, but it's very rare to see the Chinese male actor in Hollywood movies, which is something I take great umbrage with. You know, my son is Asian. He may want to direct one day; he may want to be an actor like his father - and I want that to be open to him.

I do like to move and get physical in my movies.

I am not a demon. I am a lizard, a shark, a heat-seeking panther. I want to be Bob Denver on acid playing the accordion.

To be a good actor you have to be something like a criminal, to be willing to break the rules to strive for something new.

Everything we do impacts someone else's life.

I do enjoy animated movies. I really love anime and movies like 'Spirited Away' and 'Howl's Moving Castle.'

My mother was a dancer, so I like to use the body as part of the instrument of acting.

I'm not a trained actor. I'm someone who is autodidactic and learned on my own.

I think I've become more relaxed throughout my career. I don't feel the need to jump up and down and make a big noise to get people to pay attention to me. I don't need to do punk rock gestures or eat a cockroach or do something weird to say I exist.

I think anything that opens my mind and triggers my imagination I'm reading. I like to read science fiction and imagine the character. Anything that keeps my imagination flowing.

I cry a lot. My emotions are very close to my surface. I don't want to hold anything in so it festers and turns into pus - a pustule of emotion that explodes into a festering cesspool of depression.

My father once said, 'If you're in the desert and you're dying of thirst, are you going to drink a glass of blood or are you going to drink a glass of water?' I think what he was trying to say, interesting coming from my blood father, is sometimes there are people in your family that can be toxic.

One of the great bonuses of being a film actor is that I get to go to different places, meet inspiring people and learn different things. So all those details add up.

With my name in cement, I feel actualised. - On cementing his hand prints on Sunset Boulevard

It's important to keep the eccentric spirit alive, because when that goes, the work will go.

Most of my favourite moments in film have been when I've had an opportunity to say something from scratch, something original, whether I jotted down a few lines or it came out in improvisation.

Passion is very important to me. If you stop enjoying things, you've got to look at it, because it can lead to all kinds of depressing scenarios.

If I could have been a marine biologist I would have, but I didn't have that kind of intelligence. Numbers were never my strong point.

If you have people that totally support you and have your back, I feel like you have all the confidence in the world, and you believe that you can do things that most people can't achieve. I feel that's really important.

I remember once imagining what my life would be like, what I'd be like. I pictured having all these qualities, strong positive qualities that people could pick up on from across the room. But as time passed, few became qualities that I actually had. And all the possibilities I faced, and the sorts of people I could be, all of them got reduced every year to fewer and fewer until finally they got reduced to one - to who I am. And that's who I am.

I like both Blu-ray and DVD, but Blu-ray gives you more options.

Actors have an opportunity to use storytelling as a way to solve pain.

I'm legally unable to ride motorcycles. It's a contract that I have with my life insurance, so whenever I get a chance to do a movie and ride a bike I go for it.

I always add a year to myself, so I'm prepared for my next birthday. So when I was 39, I was already 40.

Remakes are always a challenge and they always are sitting ducks.

To begin... To begin... How to start? I'm hungry. I should get coffee. Coffee would help me think. Maybe I should write something first, then reward myself with coffee. Coffee and a muffin. Okay, so I need to establish the themes. Maybe a banana-nut. That's a good muffin.

I generally enjoy the rehearsal process because that's where you can share your ideas, get your thoughts and feelings out and see whether or not they're going to land, whether or not people are going to agree with them, particularly the director. So you can sort out in that process any elements that need to be sorted out before you're on the set, and of course that saves time and it also makes everyone more comfortable working together.

I try not to be proud. I try to actively attack pride.

Nobody ever thinks clearly at the airport.

I needed to change my name just to liberate myself and find out I could do it without walking into a Hollywood casting office with the name Coppola.

I will promise you that if I can give you two good scenes -- which is what I always try to do in every movie -- then I feel like I'm doing my job.

Actors work with their look. I come from the Lon Chaney Sr. school of acting. I'll wear wigs, I'll wear nose pieces, I'll wear green contact lenses in my eyes. I'll do whatever I need to do to create a character.

Don't lose the best thing in your life just because you are not sure.

Shock is still fun. I won't ever shut the door on it.

I'm sticking my tongue out in scenes to try to make that work in 3D. I'm thinking I'll try to get my tongue all the way out to the second row of the audience.

Mel Blanc is a hero because of what he could do with his voice for all the Looney Tunes, the Warner Brothers cartoons, to be the voice of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd, Porky Pig. To me, he's a great actor.

How do you rebel in a family of rebels?

I think on some level, all of us have a little bit of belief in the possibility of different energies and forces and things like that. Otherwise, we wouldn't be afraid of them. Or there wouldn't be so many movies about them.

I guess it would fall into the stalker category more or less. I was being stalked by a mime - silent but maybe deadly. Somehow, this mime would appear on the set of 'Bringing Out the Dead' and start doing strange things. I have no idea how it got past security. Finally, the producers took some action and I haven't seen the mime since. But it was definitely unsettling.

I would like to find a way to embrace what Led Zeppelin did, in filmmaking.

I do enjoy animated movies.

Well, Amber [Heard] is still raising her eyebrow at me because I said that I've been 180 miles per hour on the 405 freeway on a motorcycle and she doesn't believe me but it's a true story. I did it coming home from work at 3 in the morning on another movie I made about cars called Gone in 60 Seconds. I bought a Yamaha-1 and I was doing 180 miles per hour home on the 405 and that's really, really crazy but I did it.

My definition of a father is someone who empowers their children.

Zoology has always been interesting to me. Nature is fascinating.

Sometimes people think I'm wearing a wig when I'm not wearing a wig, and then sometimes they think I'm not wearing a wig when I am wearing a wig.

Without mentioning any names, I looked at pretty much every story that may come to your mind about a politician on the rise who was stopped short or dragged down by personal flaws and then became just a media storm. I see this as a thing that continues to happen in America and I wanted to say something about that.

One of the things that's interesting to me is I find things like caffeine and stunts actually relax me. When they're putting a bit of gel on my arm and lighting me on fire, or when I'm about to go into a high-speed car chase or rev a motorcycle up pretty fast, I find everything else around me slows down.

When I won the Oscar, I made a point of actively going against that and doing adventure films like 'Con Air' and 'Gone in 60 Seconds,' not what would be expected.

You can't make your choices based on what critics think. You have to make your choices based on what's honest for you.

I'm a seeker. I'm very much a believer in science. But I do think there are times when science and mysticism intersect.

Often you hear stories about never working with children. I disagree because children still have that residual magical thinking. They haven't had their imagination knocked out of them by turning into adults and life experiences.

I believe that there's a way to question authority with manners, with dignity. There's no reason to be rude about it.

I love it all. I don't want to go through my career with one hand tied behind my back. I love making kids happy. I love the midnight audience. I like intense dramas. And I like high-adrenaline action films.

Tattoos to me are the outward symbol of the inward change within my soul.

Peter Fonda is the reason I became a motorcyclist. I saw Easy Rider and I bought a motorcycle the next day, and I rode it all the way from LA to San Francisco.

When I'm in England, I know I'm a visitor, but being a white man in England with ancestry that's German and Italian, I have a history with the Romans and the Saxons. I feel some connection and ancestry here, as weird as that sounds.

I think the paparazzi might have chased me out of Los Angeles.

I care about the connection with the audience. Film is such a powerful medium. Movies can change the way people think.

I don't like it when people on the street say "smile" or "cheer up." It's a real cheap line. I'm feeling good. I'm feeling real grateful for everything. It's a solid time in my life. When people say I look sad, they're wrong.

You get dinged for wanting to do a comedy, then wanting to do a big-budget action film, and then wanting to do an indie. But you can't let other people trying to label you get in the way of trying to do something artistically.

First of all the criteria that I have that goes into any career decision is whether or not I have the life experience, emotional resources to play the part truthfully or the imagination. Second, would be the director.

I wanted to make an image for myself as an outlaw type. A kind of rock 'n' roll sensibility.

I have eclectic tastes in the movies I want to do.

I always say, if you think it’s over the top then tell me where the top is first. I don’t think anyone can. But if you can tell me where the top is then I’ll tell you whether or not I’m over it.

Science fiction is a way that I can go into the abstract, go into the imagination, and audiences are still willing to go along for the ride.

I'm always going to judge somebody on their work ethic, and whether or not they made me feel something, or whether or not I felt they did a good job. To me, it's important to try to block anything personal out and look at the performance, in any field.

If you're really special, meaning you're doing something unique and original, it could scare people.

Someone like Vincent Price or somebody like Christopher Lee, they never won an award, and it doesn't matter. They're cool.

Yeah, my real name is Coppola. I changed it because they'd think I was some nepotism-oriented kid.

I don't drink blood, and last time I looked in the mirror, I had a reflection.

Those who have the ability to take action have the responsibility to take action.

I want to always find new ways of reinventing myself.

I don't know if my wife left me because of my drinking or I started drinking 'cause my wife left me.

One of the first signs of being depressed is that you lose interest in things. That's why I think it is important to stay passionate.

I love all animals. I have a fascination with fish, birds, whales - sentient life - insects, reptiles.

The only reason why I tend to pass on a movie is either I don't think I'm right for the material and can't play it honestly, or because of time constraints with personal things in my life.

I love England - it's no secret.

I'm not really interested in playing famous people. I prefer to create characters. And I hope I have an exciting enough life that somebody might make a movie about that one day. I don't want to make movies about other people. I was once approached about playing Salvador Dali, which I thought would've been fun until I found out that he was proud of kicking a blind man across the street. So, I decided, I didn't want to play that guy. So, I think I'll just keep it the way it is.

I'm going to steal the Declaration of Independence.

I like being at that place where you can either fall or stand. That's where I think you really have a shot at doing something truthful.

It's always exciting when you can go into a mode where you can be both spontaneous and choreographed. Sort of in control and out of control at the same time.

As I got older, with my work, I became aware of the responsibility of film, and I feel one of the best ways I can apply myself as an actor, is to go beyond movie stardom and celebrity.

I haven't made anything I don't believe in. I've always started a movie with a song in my heart, and even when I'm a little unclear about it, something magical happens and it comes into focus in a way that I'm feeling good about.