1. Films are the marks of our engagement with life.
2. The feeling is in the material, and editing is how to extract it from the material.
3. Films are proof that I am alive, that I am a human being.
4. An artist should lead by example in the fight against one’s desires.
5. Sadness and sorrow, when in public display, are invariably for show.
6. The lure of stories. The temptations of common aesthetics. The trap of praise and recognition.
7. Words do well in expressing emotions, while photos and videos do well in conveying reality.
8. If you are tolerant of actors, you are cruel to your audience.
9. Stories mark the beginning of the fall.
10. What matters is that the audience believes you: films are nothing more than artistic imagination; they never portray the world as it is.
11. Why do I make films? I’m becoming less and less confident—when filmmaking has become a job.
12. A miracle in cinematography: seizing a scene that is not in one’s control and being able to use it.
13. Add reality to reality, and you might not get reality.
14. In the face of something real, artful cinematography might actually destroy it.
15. Some memories, which people take great pains to unearth, may turn out to be hell.
16. Most films are a prison. Both they and their audience are like caged birds, who cannot engage with the external world, connect with real time, and extend in real space, whereupon the audience become a group of hostages.
17. Good acting means having the courage (the ability) to show people the most personal aspect of yourself.
18. The moment humanity emerges, and the lens establishes an emotional link with the characters, cinematography comes into being.
19. Sooner or later a film will come to its end, and life moves on. We should think carefully about how we can let the characters live on in another space...
20. Covering up is also one way to uncover the truth.
21. I make films to keep myself human.
Jin Jiang
