Al Pacino Quotes That Are dynamic, iconic and intense

I always tell the truth. Even when I lie.

Forget the career, do the work. If you feel what you are doing is on line and you're going someplace and you have a vision and you stay with it, eventually things will happen.

If you get all tangled up, just tango on.

Be careful how you judge people, most of all friends. You don't sum up a man's life in one moment.

My weaknesses... I wish I could come up with something. I'd probably have the same pause if you asked me what my strengths are. Maybe they're the same thing.

Without coffee something’s missing

On any given Sunday you're gonna win or you're gonna lose.

The point is -- can you win or lose like a man?

I asked god for a bike, but god doesn't work that way. So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness.

We start to realize that there are anodynes in life that help us through the day. I don't care if it's a walk in the park, a look out the window, a good bubble bath - whatever. Even a meal you like, or a friend you want to call. That helps us solve all this stuff in our head.

The only thing in this world that gives orders is balls.

My best advice to any young person is, if you want kids, be careful who you have them with. That's my mantra.

There was a time in my life when being dishonest with women was the natural way to be. I finally said, "Hey, I have to stop this silliness."

I love work because it keeps sex in perspective. Otherwise, it can become a preoccupation.

I believe in one day at a time; you've got TODAY, that's what you' ve got.

"To be or not to be is" [by William Shakespeare] beyond anything I can comprehend. I understand it on a superficial level, but the depth of it just boggles my mind. I think it's probably the greatest of all speeches ever written.

Love is overrated. Biochemically no different than eating large quantities of chocolate

It's never really that much fun for me to do movies anyway, because you - you know, you have to get up very early in the morning and you have to go in and you spend a lot of time waiting around.

I don’t understand the hatred and fear of gays and bisexuals and lesbians… it’s a concept I honestly cannot grasp. To me, it’s not who you love… a man, a woman, what have you… it’s the fact that you love. That is all that truly matters.

I was playing a part of someone dealing dope on a street corner - and there was a guy actually dealing heroin right there. I looked at him, he looked at me, and I got real confused.

That's the way to live - around people who care.

It may be a tough ride, but something is going to come out of it.

Actually, the person I related to was James Dean.

I grew up with the Dean thing. Rebel Without A Cause had a very powerful effect on me.

The actor becomes an emotional athlete. The process is painful -- my personal life suffers.

There are many things my father taught me here in this room.

He taught me: keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.

The play is the source, it is orchestrated with words. In a movie, you are not dealing with as much as that. There are machines and wires. When you're acting for a camera, it keeps taking and never giving back.

The literal, basic thing of the stage is really like a magnet. It brings me back to earth.

I'm not a violent person, never was, but I have this temperament that I've always displayed. I guess it has to do with my tradition and being Italian, we're very outgoing with our emotions.

I hope the perception is that I'm an actor, I never intended to be a movie star.

When [Julia Marie Pacino] was 5 or 6 years old, we were in an Italian restaurant, and these people came by the table and they would start talking to me, asking me for my autograph and she just went under the table.

I don't like a lot of things like [Iraq], I never did. Being in a position of celebrity and having your words carry such unnatural weight...I've always been a bit squeamish when it came to that kind of thing.

I would say I am more concerned with the plays I'm going to do than the movies. I'm more comfortable in a play. In film, there's always a certain sense of control, of holding back. The stage is different ; there's more to act. There are more demands put on you, more experiences to go through.

I used to say I wanted to genuflect to a woman, put her up on a pedestal higher and higher, way up beyond my grasp...Then I'd find another one.

I want to be a great actor someday, and I've decided there's no use philosophizing; the only way is to work at my craft.

Our ability to manufacture fraud now exceeds our ability to detect it.

When you perform with a live audience, the audience comes back to you, so that you and the audience are giving to each other, in a sense. It's an extraordinary thing. It's wild turf up there.

The reasons you have for doing a movie will vary with the way your life is going. There was a time when a made a some movies because I felt I needed to work. And I didn't think about the material as much. But sometimes I've thought about the material a lot and thought I was doing the right thing, and it didn't work out.

Whether he's doing great acting or not, you're seeing somebody who is in the tradition of a great actor. What he does with it, that's something else, but he's got it all. The talent, the instrument is there, that's why he has endured.

I'm constantly striving to break through to something new. You try to maintain a neutral approach to your work, and not be too hard on yourself.

There are a couple of times I would've liked to have married. I think I made a mistake, especially once.

I wanted to be a baseball player, naturally, but I wasn't good enough. I didn't know what I was going to do with my life. I just had a kind of energy, I was a fairly happy kid.

I turned down a lot of films before I made my first one. I knew that it was time for me to get into movies.

The thing that can get you a little upset is when people say other people are better than you. That can bug you.

I went to Performing Arts because that was the only school that would accept me. My scholastic level was not very high.

I'm an actor, and everything about me - the way I perceive things, the way I have seen the world - has been in relation to characters and how I would want to play something or not play it.

People are always asking me to do Shakespeare - at home, at colleges, on film locations, in restaurants. It's like playing a piece of music, getting all the notes. It's great therapy.

I come from the South Bronx - a true descendant of the melting pot. I grew up in a really mixed neighborhood; it was a very integrated life.

I've had very deep relationships that lasted for long periods of time with people - you could almost call them marriages, even though I didn't marry. But it was costly.

I haven't encouraged [Julia Marie Pacino] or discouraged her. I let her go her own way. I did say to her that I thought that she had a real gift, and it's a good idea to know that. It's always good to go with your gift.

Jamie Foxx does a good rendition of me. It's a real gift, mimicry of that kind, the tonal thing. It's sort of like having a talent for playing an instrument.

Responsibilities are relative. My responsibility is to a character in a script, to a part I'm playing.