Michael Arndt Quotes

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

• Thinking
• Writing
• Mind
• Trying
• Mountain
• Metaphor

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Quotes to Explore

• You can be an Olympic champion in 9.5 secs, but to be the greatest, there's more to it. It takes a bit of forethought and a lot of mental application.

  

  Daley Thompson
  • You
  • Champion
  • Greatest

• To read without reflecting is like eating without digesting.

  

  Edmund Burke
  • Education
  • Like
  • Eating

• I worked with HBO on 'Recount,' and we had a wonderful experience together. I'm such a fan of HBO and how much flexibility they give in character as well as schedule.

  

  Laura Dern
  • Character
  • Experience
  • Together

• There are no limits to our future if we don't put limits on our people.

  

  Jack Kemp
  • People
  • Future
  • Limits

• I don't know if I'd say I feel green, but I'm getting to know myself as an actor now in a way that I never did as a kid.

  

  Gaby Hoffmann
  • Know
  • Myself
  • Green

• People can't even imagine that it's possible to succeed anymore.

  

  Najat Vallaud-Belkacem
  • People
  • Succeed
  • Possible

• It is your work in life that is the ultimate seduction.

  

  Pablo Picasso
  • Life
  • Work
  • Ultimate

• My involvement in the political arena is to make sure there's a place for culture.

  

  Yo-Yo Ma
  • Political
  • Culture
  • Place

• I wasn't making music consciously when I was younger. I was a musician, but that has its own stigmas. Anywhere on the planet, it's one of the more undervalued positions.

  

  Keinan Abdi Warsame
  • Music
  • More
  • Planet

• I don't think that's healthy for the country when anyone thinks their morals are better than anyone else's.

  

  Barbara Bush
  • Country
  • Better
  • Healthy

• I mentioned the non-competitive spirit explicitly, because these days, excellence is a fashionable concept. But excellence is a competitive notion, and that is not what we are heading for: we are heading for perfection.

  

  Edsger Dijkstra
  • Excellence
  • Perfection
  • Days

• If you work out 20 minutes a day in some way, you're going to see changes.

  

  Kate Hudson
  • Work
  • Day
  • Changes

• There are stories I'd like to tell, I'd like to see, and they're not getting made. These stories are beyond the experience of the people in power. They don't understand it, so they're frightened of it.

  

  Randa Haines
  • People
  • Experience
  • Power

• Nothing that comes from the deep, passional soul is bad, or can be bad.

  

  D. H. Lawrence
  • Bad
  • Soul
  • Deep

• The Gothic tradition was begun by Ann Radcliffe, a rare example of a woman creating an artistic style.

  

  Camille Paglia
  • Style

• An infinite number of monkeys typing into GNU emacs would never make a good program.

  

  Linus Torvalds
  • Good

• I find that life is easier when it is just a blurWith no details to confuse who or what or where I wasSo when the ending comes the full regret will be obscure

  

  Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
  • Life
  • Regret

• What should I do with your strong, manly, spirited sketches, full of variety and glow? How could I possibly join them on to the little bit (two inches wide) of ivory on which I work with so fine a brush, as produces little effect after much labour?

  

  Jane Austen
  • Work
  • Strong

• I am not in the giving vein today.

  

  William Shakespeare
  • Today
  • Giving
  • Charity

• The mind passes in an instant from east to west; and all the great incorporeal things resemble these very closely in speed.

  

  Leonardo da Vinci
  • Great
  • Mind

• That’s the thing, chato. I’m not the one to tell it, and you aren’t the one to hear it, but rest assured that it’d be pretty tough to figure out …

  

  Paco Ignacio Taibo II
  • Rest
  • Thing
  • Figure Out

• I hope that I'm not the type of person who, standing at the doorway to hell, strikes a heroic pose and then starts frowning with indecision.

  

  Liu Xiaobo
  • Hope
  • Person
  • Hell

• 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
  • Thinking
  • Writing
  • Mind