Matt Damon Thinking Quotations

I think it's still hard for me to turn down work if it's really good because for so many years I was so desperate to get a job and couldn't and so it's kind of an anathema for me to turn down work.

As for poker, I've stayed away from that, even though when I was in Vegas for Ocean's Eleven, I would get accosted by these guys begging me to play. They just want to take my money. They see me, think 'actor' and see some easy money.

I think it's something that the citizenry needs to be vigilant about - participating in democracy, and that includes issues like what's going on and how much secrecy and transparency there should be. That's an on-going thing - in a democracy you want checks and balances and oversight, but you need a covert agency to protect the country. It's a very tricky balance and I think it changes as the world changes and I think we all need to be mindful of that.

People do things in the names of good, and in the name of ideals, but the world isn't that simple. So they end up doing things that aren't necessarily good. Even if they think they're doing the right thing, but when viewed from a different perspective they can look barbaric and crazy.

If there's an idea I think is really good and I feel like I can write it, then I'll do it.

I think what makes a good actor's director is the same thing that makes a good director. Acting is just one of the trades necessary to make a movie.

As somebody who makes his living in the movie business and wants to contribute to it, I think that the best chance I have of doing that is just consistently working with great directors.

Our kids are growing up with more privilege than we had; that's true for most of my friends in L.A. I don't know any actor who grew up with any particular privilege, so everyone wrestles with this. And I think, a lot of times, it's about being patient with your kids.

I think marrying somebody who's not a celebrity, it just takes a lot of the pressure off.

I think what makes a good actor's director is somebody who understands what I'm doing and is respectful of it, but who also has a vision and is directing me toward their vision in a way that feels productive.

I'm not Brad Pitt or George Clooney. Those guys walk into a room and the room changes. I think there's something more... not average, but everyman about me.

There are people who appear in the magazines and I don't know who they are. I've never seen anything they've done and their careers are over already. They're famous for maybe 10 minutes. Real careers, I think, take a long time to unfold.

I'd had people say, 'You'll enjoy being famous for a week, and you'll never enjoy it again'. But I don't think I had that week. I may have been working and missed that moment.

I need to know if she [Sarah Palin] thinks dinosaurs were here four thousand years ago... because she's going to have the nuclear code.

Bond is part of the system. He's an imperialist and a misogynist, and he laughs at killing people, and he sits there slugging martinis. It'll never be the same thing as this, because Bourne is a guy who is against the establishment, who is paranoid and on the run. I just think fundamentally they're just very different things.

I grew up in and the teachers. I think I was very lucky. I think I had a lot of social capital, and so when I found myself in this position of influence, I just - then I started to engage a bit with some of the problems in the world and realize that I could actually have an impact.

It's just better to be yourself than to try to be some version of what you think the other person wants.

I think what's important for kids to know is that your decisions here on earth matter, your behavior matters and how you treat other people matters.