Quotes

[on the 1965 Blake Edwards film "The Great Race (1965)"] It's sorta like the "Lawrence of Arabia" of comedies.

[About Ghostbusters (1984)] The cool thing is that when I was a kid, I was only familiar with the cartoon, and then I was like, "Dude, there's a movie? Dude, they swear up a storm? Dude, they're smoking? This is bad ass!" And to me, they still are pretty bad ass. They're comedians with weapons. They're practically my personal heroes.

When I think of good CG effects, I think of something that either looks realistic like Gollum or the Headless Horseman, or something stylized like Sin City or Across the Universe.

If you like a movie that nobody else likes, enjoy it. If you hate a movie that everyone else loves, hate it. It's fine. If you can explain it and if you can have people understand why you don't like something, that's a very good way of being more open.

Some are wondering my thoughts on feminism. In short, I think women can be tougher and men can be more understanding. I'm not against submissive women or dominant men, nature often chooses us for those roles, but we're an evolving animal, and by keeping us in roles I believe we learn less. But ultimately, I believe in people just being themselves, whatever "role" that is. I never want to force it on anyone.

Dammit people! Don't tell me Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011) is good! I've already decided to hate it before even seeing it! Don't force me to be fair! Don't force me to be fair!

I realize I have no answers to anything in life, none. I only have assumptions, some more probable than others. I know nothing for sure, and thank God. The possibilities then for anyone and anything are endless, and that gives me more hope and confidence than any answer of absolute certainty ever could.

With the bullying heat of summer, the freezing cold of winter, and the miserable rain of spring, fall is easily the best kind of season. It offers wonderful colors, relaxing winds, and several of people's favorite holidays. And for those who do not enjoy the season or find it painfully unpleasant, I'm glad to say there is an extra hour thrown in as well. So you can sleep in even longer to avoid it while the rest of us stay up even longer to enjoy it.

I was introduced the other day as "Having fans who include Roger Ebert, Paul Dini, and the creators of Animaniacs (1993). Appeared on PBS, written about in the New York Times, worked with the stars of Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988), and awarded Entrepreneur of the Year at the 4th Annual Mashable Awards." If somebody told me this five years ago, I'd say it was not only a fabricated work of fiction, but a lousy one at that. Thank heavens God is such a wonderfully horrible writer.

A great story is great, but if you have a great character, that writes the story for you half the time.

I told someone the other day that I wished him the best. It suddenly occurred to me just how dangerous the best can be for some people. For Hitler had the best, so did Hussein, and so did Gaddafi. Perhaps it is better to wish someone that they instead take care of themselves, and preferably others. For what good does wishing the best do if one does not use it to fix the worst?

I heard a man explaining to someone younger that it was never right to hit a woman. Good to know, here I was under the impression it was never right to hit anybody.

Words cannot describe how hyped I am to see the new Twilight movie. Why? Because unlike most of it's younger viewers who will no doubt grow up and look back at the phenomenon laughing hysterically, I am among the privileged adults who can look at the phenomenon and laugh hysterically while it's still going on. Most comedians wish they could fill me with as much joy as the Twilight movies have.

Everyone's been asking me what it's like to be 30. It feels eerily similar to when I was 29. My teeth haven't fallen out, my eyesight hasn't vanished, my hair is still on my head (well, most of it). Really the only difference is the world suddenly seems much more interested in my age and how I feel about it. If that's the worst 30 has to offer, then it doesn't feel like that bad an age at all.

[November, 2011] They say there's a movement that's trying to get started called "Occupy Black Friday." People are encouraged to buy local and give none of their money to the big corporations the day after Thanksgiving. I'm sorry, as much as I would love to fight for a good cause and stick it to the business using our media to control every aspect of our lives............I have to go see the Muppet movie.

I always give credit to people who can put their darkest moments on film or video. It's not easy, especially when so many want to label people to make things easier for themselves, even if it means making things hard for others. I advise before calling anyone an anything to think about the possibilities of the human being. Everyone has a story, everyone has a tragedy, everyone has made mistakes, and everyone has something incredible to share if you look close enough. The human animal is far too interesting and full of surprises to be limited to just a name or a category. To minimize one's potential is to minimize your own. To inspire growth is to build something bigger than yourself.

Christmas for many has gone beyond being a religious holiday. It's a time of celebrating, sharing, and expressing each other's love, no matter what your faith or belief. Some get uncomfortable by the fact that many don't celebrate the birth of the Christ child, but people share their joy, give to others, and express their love regardless. Christmas has evolved into something that's hard to put into words, something powerful, something joyous, something that encourages the best in others. All of these things are the focus of Christianity as well as several other religions. The power of Christmas has spread so far that people celebrate the ideals of this faith even if they don't practice the faith itself. And they celebrate it for the right reasons, because they believe people are good and can continue to be good. Christmas transcends belief, transcends details, transcends what we see as right and wrong. Instead we acknowledge the human spirit for what it is, and no matter what, how, or why you acknowledge it, it is a good thing to recognize. Merry Christmas!

I often wonder if you can learn more about a person by their enemies than you can by their friends.

I try not to get into too many political issues, but I have no problem stating I am very pro Gay Marriage. Going to such lengths to fight for love in the face of such discrimination, especially when the divorce rate for straight people is as high as it is, personally, I say these people are saving the sanctity of marriage, not destroying it.

It's Sunday, time for everyone to put on their finest clothes, come together in one building, and give praise to the holiest and highest power we admire... Oscar.

You may act like you hate Disney. You may talk about how it's an evil corporate monster that only gets stronger and stronger the longer we live, but the funny thing is: you don't have a choice. You can bombard us with all the ingenious monstrous things that Disney has done in the past. You can argue debatable messages. You can argue debatable ethics. You can even argue debatable stereotypes, but it doesn't matter. Disney has always been there. For most of us, it's the first thing we're introduced to and that's the genius of Disney putting all their time and all their effort not in something adult, but in something for children, and once something has your childhood by the balls, it's never going to leave you. It's there forever. Disney has practically become family to us. It's fairy tales, it's magic, it's everything we enjoyed and thought was possible when we were younger, and as we grow older, there's a lot of other things to enjoy: the artistry, the creativity, the imagination. There's literally no other word for it but Disney. It's an artistic cultural phenomenon that will never ever leave.

Okay, so a bajillion people have filled up my Facebook page with news about a new Garbage Pail Kids Movie, so I guess many of you want to know my thoughts. Honestly, it's the same as with any movie, it can work if done right. I loved the cards growing up, though I don't know how adaptable they are to a story, but anything is possible. If they get a clever writer and clever director, maybe it could translate into a clever movie. And I honestly think it's hard to top the horribleness of the original film, but I will say if there's anyone who can, it's Hollywood. We'll see what turns up.

So let me get this straight: I get to the plane 9 minutes ahead of schedule and the lady closing the gate says I have to be there 10 minutes ahead of schedule, even though I've never been told this by anyone, not even on the ticket. The doors are open, people are still getting on, and yet the lady says it's to much work to unhook the velvet rope and let me pass. This is how UB Con lost Doug for a day and how United Airlines lost a customer for life. Will be there tomorrow kids, promise.

Make cookies, not war.

Where does Oscar the Grouch go to the bathroom? These things keep me up at night.

Went to a club for a bachelor party but was told one of our friends couldn't come in because he was wearing shorts, which was too "indecent" for their dress code. However, 6 women walking right by us wearing skirts up to their pubic hair and shirts cut so low you could read their nipple ring price tags was totally acceptable. Double Standards: it's not just for women anymore.

[on Roger Ebert] It really, really breaks my heart that he's gone. But what I do know is that what he's left us is a great education about movies, about understanding movies, about the passion of loving movies, and that's a greater education that I know I couldn't teach, I know so many other critics couldn't teach, but he found a way and he did it so unbelievably well. And I can say very honestly, so many people got it. We heard it and we loved it and we loved you, Roger Ebert. I'm the nostalgia critic and you will always be remembered.

[on Batman (1989)] I know it's strange putting a superhero movie over a cinematic master like Kubrick but I really just adore this movie.

[on Amadeus (1984)] This is another movie that's just perfect. Perfect writing, perfect pacing, perfect acting, perfect directing. It's actually a lot like one of Mozart's operas oddly enough. If you were to add anything or take anything away it would cease being perfect. In fact, they released a Director's Cut not that long ago and wouldn't you know it? It simply wasn't as good.

[on The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 (2011)] Okay, now let's talk about some of the things that this movie wants to partake in, okay. Well, we have Marriage. Great, I'd love to see Twilight fuck that up and they do. We have sex, Vampire sex, Vampire-Teenage Human sex and it's great, it's so stupid, it's over-the- Wonderful, love it, love it, love it. Abortion? Huh? I'm gonna repeat that. Twilight, Twilight is going to talk to us about abortion. Twilight? Fucking Twi- Okay, let me give you an idea of the weight of this word, okay, I mean not even just the issue, just the fucking word. You say that word, I saw Louis Black recently and he described it as, he brought it up in his stand-up, he said: "Just saying that word has clenched everybody's asshole in the audience up, everybody tightens when they hear that word." That's how hot a subject issue, okay, it's like you don't fuck around with this, okay, or if you're going to talk about it you better goddamn know what you're talking about, okay. The only people that really talk about it are either people who really know what they're talking about- let me put it this way: people who should be talking about it are either people who really know what they're talking about, or they're using it as a joke to show that they don't know what they're talking about 'cos I make jokes about abortion, you know, I've made several. But the idea is to show that, you know, the character is a moron, or using it as an analogy, you know, to press a button for shock value, you know, but we're not really going to talk about it. This is Twilight trying to talk seriously about the issue of abortion, because, as I'm not giving anything away here this is in the trailers, Bella gets pregnant and they really talk, actually I say really, they just sort of throw this shit at you about whether or not they should keep it, and in fact it's not even a discussion, it's- okay, this was my hot-button with this movie, okay, this is when I said: "This film is sick. This is a disgusting, sick despicable movie".

[on The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 (2011)] You gotta go over what I thought of the other movies, of course. The first Twilight, I know what you're thinking - Oh, I probably hated those movies and stuff - no, I frigging love these movies, they are beautifully bad films, they are hilarious, I loved them. Okay, the first film, you know, where they meet for the first time: pretentious girl has no problems, really over the top pale vampire that everyone in the world can tell is a vampire except for our main character, of course, is nothing like a vampire, is totally full of himself, totally pretentious, totally just- but somehow every girl's dream because he stares off and looks, you know, sad; "Oh, I want him!" Love it, absolutely love it. Second one, The vampire boy leaves. "Aww," you know "that fop was fun!" But we've still got Bella and she's a bitch and she's insane and she's crazy, love it. You get this boy Jacob who's this werewolf boy, and she has some luck picking boys, and he is the only decent character that goes through these movies, he is a good boy, he is a good- he makes me hard, man, this is a nice kid, he is supportive, he makes sacrifices, he is like the perfect guy and yet somehow this dumbass broad keeps wanting the vampire. So love it, absolutely love it. Third one comes along, the third one I discussed with people, I think was trying to be a good movie and maybe had a possibly good director, but you know it takes a few shots at itself, you know, "Does he ever wear a shirt?" or something like that. And some of the conversations were almost kind of smart, but it's still the writing, it's still Stephanie Meyer you can't save it. So that was probably the least bad of the movies and probably the least funny though it had some good, you know, stupid scenes in it really enjoyable, I'm really loving these movies. I was hyped, frigging hyped to see this film, I couldn't wait. I saw the midnight showing, alright, I went up there and nothing but girls and boyfriends that were dragged and they just looked so miserable and it's- that's the perfect crowd to see this shit with! Sit down, the movie begins and it's just like the first one, I'm enjoying it so much the dialogue is horrendous, the things they're talking about are horrendous, it's so unrealistic, it's so playing to girls', you know, emotions and manipulating it however they want, you know, just the teenage impressionable mind, loving it.

[on Ed Wood (1994)] Everyone who wants to go into a creative medium, especially film, should definitely see this movie.

I've gotten a lot of mileage out of that black wig. It's still the same one as it was when I first put it on.

Spirited Away (2001) is so good I actually sort of hate it. I'm jealous of it. I'm jealous of its likable characters. I'm jealous of its creative story. I'm jealous of its unbelievable visuals. It's not an idea that's based off of any book, movie or TV show. It's just all originality and I frigging love that!

[Ed Wood (1994)] reminds me that even if I think my stuff is great, there's always the chance that it's pure crap.

[on Good Night, and Good Luck. (2005)] I didn't really know who Edward R. Murrow was before this movie, so I'm really glad I could be introduced to him this way. The question about how far do you take journalism is questioned quite often in this movie. Murrow goes beyond just reporting the news, he actually points out what's being done in the McCarthy era is wrong and challenges the government to prove otherwise. This starts a war of rhetoric as both sides attack one another in what they think is right for the American people. I just adore the dialogue in this movie. I love how calculated, calm, and to-the-point it is when fighting such a controversial battle. It's all done in language, not with political stunts or planned distractions. It's just all words. I could hear the words that Murrow spoke to the American people over and over, they're so brilliantly chosen. It's a very poignant work about standing up for what you believe in and taking the responsibility to follow through with it. And again, very little is made up, the majority of what happened in the movie really did in fact happen. They even show the footage that McCarthy released to the people calling Murrow 'the leader of the jackal pack'. It's hard to believe they could really talk like that back then.

[on A Clockwork Orange (1971)] For me, this is sort of a life-changing movie, a film that really made me question choice, free will, good, evil, and everything in between. The premise is brilliant, creating Alex, the most despicable and mentally psychotic human being, and taking away his choice, transforming him into an upright citizen. But he finds the civilized, peaceful world turns him into an outlet for their own rage and fear. It's just a great idea. I love the scene where the journalist tries to help him out and acknowledges that what society has done to him is barbaric, but when he finds out that Alex has wronged him in the past, all his ethics disappear and he becomes one of those vengeful barbarians himself. That's just perfect. Stanley Kubrick's direction is wonderful, even if parts of it are a tad outdated. The angles, motion and surreal atmosphere just add to the disturbing environment he's trying to create. It's a film that makes you ponder and question, like most great films do, about choice, violence and the human mind. A Clockwork Orange is an easy fit for my #12 spot.

[on Citizen Kane (1941)] I saw this film in high school and I remember saying to myself, 'Yeah, come on, greatest movie of all time. Show me what you got.' Literally as soon as the movie started, I was hooked. I love the atmosphere. I love the Gothic angles. And I love the character study of Mr. Kane as he's seen through various people. It's obviously the film that changed everything in terms of movie-making, but it still really holds up in my opinion. I love the characters. I love the way the story is told. Every single shot of this movie is just unbelievable to look at, even by today's standards. The shadows are just wonderful; it just compliments the mood and atmosphere that the movie's trying to create. Now, I know it's weird putting what's considered the greatest film of all time in the #10 spot. But remember these aren't what I consider the best films of all time, they're just my personal favorites. Either way, I think Citizen Kane's gonna stay on the list. The greatest film of all time? Yeah, it's kind of hard not to like it, isn't it?

[on Fearless (1993)] This is a sort of hypnotizing movie, almost like you're in a daze most of the time. A film that draws you in from beginning to end and makes you wanna confront real undiluted pain in the hopes of conquering it. Jeff Bridges plays the survivor of an airplane crash and it leaves strange effect on him, almost like he's halfway between alive and dead. He starts seeking more thrills in the hopes of being woken up from his morbid altered state, but nothing seems to work. At times, he's unlikable, even horrible, but the movie's technique of pulling us in to what he's going through at least tries to help us understand why. The ending is one of the few scenes where I actually get a little teary-eyed at. The way they simulate an out-of-body experience really puts you in the world between life and death. And it's done so cleverly but with so little that it continues to take my breath away every time I see it. It's not always an upper, in fact, it's rarely an upper, but certainly one of those films that made me look at life a whole different way.

That awkward moment when I have to reassure everyone that those are my REAL teeth when I play Bette Midler.

I used to like watching scary films and feeling tougher for having done so afterwards.