Washblog

Matt Lauer:
Gentlemen, Both the White House and Greek government said of your films: "They are so outrageously false it's not even worth commenting.

The 41st President of the United States, the president's father, and the Greek "Colonels" have called you, I think you probably heard this, "slime balls."

Michael Moore:
Have they seen it? Have they seen the film? No. Of course they haven't. I will tell you they haven't seen it. These are un-credible reviews from people who haven't even seen the movie.

Costa Gavras:
When I did Z a lot of people said he's a communist so it's normal. And then I did "The Confession", [and] the communists said he's a right-wing person, or he tries to have a balance between both.

No, no, for a director a movie is a passion, at least it is for me. And I was able, up until now, to do the movies I would like to make.

This is helped a lot thanks to my wife, because she organised my life. I didn't have to make movies just to make money, just to live, which happens to a lot of my colleagues."

Lauer:
[To Moore] You accepted the Palm D'Or Award at the Cannes Film Festival. It's a huge honor, especially for a film like this. And you said, I think the quote was, "I did not set out to make a political film. The art of this, the cinema, comes before the politics."

Moore:
That's right. That's absolutely right.

Costa Gavras:
You know, I never thought or started saying I'm going to do a 'correct' movie. I did all those movies because they were stories I would like to tell, that touched me deeply, personally and philosophically.

Lauer: [To Moore]
I'm amazed you said it with a straight face.

Moore:
Why is that, why?

Lauer:
Because I think there is politics in every single frame of these movies.

Moore:
Oh, of course there is. Don't misunderstand me. There's politics right now in this discussion. There's politics in all aspects of our daily lives.

Costa-Gavras:
The idea was to make a movie about that system where the country's democracy stops or is completely controlled by ... lets start from the palace, and then the army, and then even some parts of the justice is part of that system.

And then everything is possible.

And what's also extraordinary in that story, because everything is true, there's no fiction in there, except very little things here and there.

read the entire article at my American Choice Website