Quotes by Akira Kurosawa

“When you are enjoying life time flies by, when you are not it stands still, though in reflection of this stillness, the observant may note how much of it has passed, and how much has been wasted...”

“Movie directors, or should I say people who create things, are very greedy and they can never be satisfied, ... Thats why they can keep on working. Ive been able to work for so long because I think next time, Ill make something good.”

“Japan does not understand very well that one of its proudest cultural achievements is in film,”

“Ill never work with you again!”

To be an artist means never to avert ones eyes.

People today have forgotten theyre really just a part of nature. Yet, they destroy the nature on which our lives depend. They always think they can make something better. Especially scientists. They may be smart, but most dont understand the heart of nature. They only invent things that, in the end, make people unhappy. Yet theyre so proud of their inventions. Whats worse, most people are, too. They view them as if they were miracles. They worship them. They dont know it, but theyre losing nature. They dont see that theyre going to perish. The most important things for human beings are clean air and clean water.

IT IS QUITE ENOUGH IF A HUMAN BEING HAS BUT ONE FIELD WHERE HE OR SHE IS STRONG. IF A HUMAN BEING WERE STRONG IN EVERY FIELD, IT WOULDNT BE NICE FOR OTHER PEOPLE, WOULD IT?

Man is a genius when he is dreaming.

If the Emperor had not delivered his [15 August 1945] address urging the Japanese people to lay down their swords—if that speech had been a call instead for the Honorable Death of the Hundred Million—those people on that street in Sōshigaya probably would have done what they were told and died. And probably I would have done likewise. The Japanese see self-assertion as immoral and self-sacrifice as the sensible course to take in life. We were accustomed to this teaching and had never thought to question it.

Although human beings are incapable of talking about themselves with total honesty, it is much harder to avoid the truth while pretending to be other people. They often reveal much about themselves in a very straightforward way. I am certain that I did. There is nothing that says more about its creator than the work itself.

In a mad world, only the mad are sane.

In the pre-war era when itinerant home-remedy salesmen still wandered the country, they had a traditional patter for selling a potion that was supposed to be particularly effective in treating burns and cuts. A toad with four legs in front and six behind would be placed in a box with mirrors lining the four walls. The toad, amazed at its own appearance from every angle, would break into an oily sweat. This sweat would be collected and simmered for 3,721 days while being stirred with a willow branch. The result was the marvelous potion.When writing about myself, I feel something like that toad in the box.

But I prefer to think of my brother as a negative strip of film that led to my own development as a positive image.

Granting that there is some truth to the theory that defects in society give rise to the emergence of criminals, I still maintain that those who use this theory as a defense of criminality are overlooking the fact that there are many people in this defective society who survive without resorting to crime. The argument to the contrary is pure sophistry.

“People today have forgotten theyre really just a part of nature. Yet, they destroy the nature on which our lives depend. They always think they can make something better. Especially scientists. They may be smart, but most dont understand the heart of nature. They only invent things that, in the end, make people unhappy. Yet theyre so proud of their inventions. Whats worse, most people are, too. They view them as if they were miracles. They worship them. They dont know it, but theyre losing nature. They dont see that theyre going to perish. The most important things for human beings are clean air and clean water.”