Jane Campion
Jane Campion
Dame Elizabeth Jane Campion DNZMis a New Zealand screenwriter, producer, and director. Campion is the second of four women ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director and is the first female filmmaker in history to receive the Palme d'Or, which she received for directing the acclaimed film The Piano, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay...
NationalityNew Zealander
ProfessionDirector
Date of Birth30 April 1954
art school reality
That's just how I see things on a base level: there's so much going on. Or at least I like to have that feeling. It's part of being interested in notions of reality apart from storytelling. I don't know if it has something to do with having an art school education, which makes you aware of the way visuals speak, or makes you trust them more.
mirrors people looks
For me, being a director is about watching, not about telling people what to do. Or maybe it's like being a mirror; if they didn't have me to look at, they wouldn't be able to put the make-up on.
romantic-love independence today
Women today are dealing with both their independence and also the fact that their lives are built around finding and satisfying the romantic models we grew up with.
heart journey people
In some ways Holy Smoke is about people's journey to the heart.
mean garden thinking
And, I mean, I think poetry does need to be met to some extent, especially, I guess, 19th century poetry, and for me, it's just been so worth the effort. It's like I'm planting a garden in my head.
evil trying too-much
What I have learned from my work up to now, is to try to be open, but also protect myself by not letting the good and the evil get too much importance.
sex people stories
You know, sex is actually not so original as the way people love or the stories behind each relationship, which is what you remember. Sex is sex in the end.
ocean piano goal
I've had a lot of different responses to my films. I got a lot of support from 'The Piano,' the obvious one, but it feels like an ocean, with a lot going on - the goal is to keep alive.
thinking ideas phrases
If you start with a good idea, you can encapsulate it in a phrase and explain it. I like high-concept films. Everyone can get hold of it. I don't think there's any harm in that at all.
mean journey poet
It's been such a deep and amazing journey for me, getting close to John Keats, and also I love Shelley and Byron. I mean, the thing about the Romantic poets is that they've got the epitaph of romantic posthumously. They all died really young, and Keats, the youngest of them all.
keys musical emotion
My musical knowledge is so bad it's embarrassing. When composers discuss music with someone as primitive as myself, they have to talk about it in terms of senses and emotion, rather than keys and tempo.
struggle writing piano
The Piano Lesson' is very sophisticated, easily the most adult or complex material I've attempted. It's the first film I've written that has a proper story, and it was a big struggle for me to write. It meant I had to admit the power of narrative.
dream thinking artist
There's no artist in this world that doesn't enjoy the dream that if they have bad reviews now, the story of Keats can redeem them, in their fantasy or imagination, in the future. I think Keats' poem 'Endymion' is a really difficult poem, and I'm not surprised that a lot of people pulled it apart in a way.
growing-up fall ethos
This is the first generation to grow up on Thatcher - it's a different ethos. It's money minded, and it's the cult of yourself. Now that's fine, except when it falls down, and you can't achieve your goals - through high unemployment, through the fact that you probably need inherited money to get anywhere.