Top 44 Hiro Murai Quotes

TV is generally an unfriendly environment for directors because you’re expected to come in and tell a story in the voice of the show that already exists and just fill in the blanks and then submit it back.

I grew up listening to hip hop and embracing black culture, probably because it was ‘outsider art.’

The most difficult thing about music videos is that a lot of young filmmakers come into the medium, and they have so many different ideas, but they need to understand what the musician wants.

I love David Lynch movies, and I like Haruki Murakami books.

Some people draw a line between music videos and short films, looking down on music videos as a format, but there’s so much potential in music videos.

I just want to do things on my own terms as much as possible.

It might sound naive, but for me, you know, for me, the important part is kind of making process. So I’m not super result oriented, and I just, like, kind of getting lost in the process of making something.

Your understanding of culture can be very skewed sometimes, depending on what you’re taking in!

I don’t like fast cuts. I’d rather shoot something that dances to the music.

Every time I’ve rushed into something, that’s usually when I have regrets.

I like absurdist aesthetics. There’s something about dream logic that’s really fascinating, how it interweaves with narrative.

Whether it’s a TV show or a music video, the seed of the idea is what’s driving my decisions, not the format or the outcome.

Part of the fun is finding out how elastic that box is and, you know, test the limits of what TV shows can do or what a music video can do.

‘Twin Peaks’ was my gateway for David Lynch.

Whenever you’re making something, you’re hoping that it connects with somebody in some big way, but I’d have to be crazy to expect that.

I thought there was a way of marrying what I wanted to do with filmmaking with pop videos, which I found out through a couple projects just wasn’t possible. That’s not saying anything about the artist. If you’re making an Usher video, you’re making an Usher video, not a film with an Usher song in it.

Directing action scenes is really just pure visual storytelling that just makes sense to me pretty intuitively.

Most of the time, I can’t listen to the song after the video’s done. Sometimes I’ll hear a song that I’ve worked on at a restaurant or on the radio, and I’ll have this visceral physical reaction.

In Japan, animation is a big part of your media diet. I moved out to Los Angeles at 9, and when I got homesick, I would watch anime.

That feeling of wavering between reality and supernatural has always been really interesting to me.

I used to be terrified of heights as a kid.

I’m one of those people who keep a dream journal.

I think a season of ‘Atlanta’ bounces back between classic sitcom structure and genre movies.

It’s very easy to fall into a rut where you’re just making things that you don’t believe in for other people.

FX is a network; that’s their whole model, letting creators make the thing they want to make and then marketing it really well.

A lot of weird things happen in life that are not always pertaining to your main objective.

I remember, when ‘Atlanta’ first happened, I didn’t know what to expect. It felt like it was a lot of responsibility.

I’m a first-generation Japanese immigrant.

I just got a Filmstruck account so I can watch all of those Criterion movies streaming. I’ve been nerding out about that.

A lot of my personality and my affinity for certain pieces of pop culture and art all stem from a sort of Japanese aesthetic and way of thinking.

I got into film school thinking I was going to make features, like every other film geek.

It’s something that I’ve always been attracted to, that idea of letting everything happen in a single frame.

Most of the time, I’m a little bewildered or sort of feel out of place.

I think music videos in particular and film in general – it’s really good at communicating tone and feeling.

I’ve loved music all my life.

We always talk about how, obviously, there is still very in-your-face aggressive racism. But there’s a lot of passive racism that, in the moment, you don’t even realize is racist. You chalk it up as a strange interaction you had, and then you look at the context of it later on and realize the root of it was racism.

I never thought of myself as a TV director.

When we were making ‘Teddy Perkins,’ we were playing with a lot of horror tropes and things you might’ve seen in movies before, but we get the ability to subvert expectations or get a comedic element out of a horror moment.

Pilots are tricky because there are so many things you have to accomplish.

‘Guava Island’ is the end result of four incredible weeks spent in Cuba with some of the most inspiring creative talents I’ve ever met.

I think to truly not know what to expect out of the story – to create a world where nothing is guaranteed – is sort of the backbone of ‘Atlanta.’

I’m a firm believer in the idea that once we make a thing and release it, my turn to talk is done. Ideally, you’re saying everything you want to say in the product you’re making, and you don’t have to add commentary to it afterwards.

I’ve always preferred being behind the camera.

Even if an episode is self-contained, the preceding episodes always affect how the audience takes it in.