Tom Hanks quotes
Born
July 9, 1956, Concord, California, U.S.
Occupation
Actor, director.
Tom Hanks is an American actor and director.
Movies
Apollo 13 (1995)
Bridge of Spies (2015)
Captain Phillips (2013)
Catch Me If You Can (2002)
Forrest Gump (1994)
Greyhound (2020)
Some people go to bed at night thinking, ‘That was a good day.’ I am one of those who worries and asks, ‘How did I screw up today?
– Tom Hanks
I don’t cause riots, but I do cause confusion. People freeze when they spot me.
– Tom Hanks
Movie-making is telling a story with the best technology at your disposal.
– Tom Hanks
There is something basic about protecting land by taking it off the market. People should be able to enjoy where they live while at the same time protect the plants and animals around them.
– Tom Hanks
There’s a difference between solitude and loneliness. I can understand the concept of being a monk for a while.
– Tom Hanks
If it wasn’t hard, everyone would do it. It’s the hard that makes it great.
– Tom Hanks
At the end of the day it’s got to be a good movie, it’s got to be a funny movie, and it’s got to make people think, ‘Hey, I couldn’t have spent my time any better.’
– Tom Hanks
If you’re funny, if there’s something that makes you laugh, then every day’s going to be okay.
– Tom Hanks
One thing that was amazing about World War II was that everybody signed up for the duration plus six months. Fliers got to leave combat after 25 missions, or 35 missions, but other than that, you were in it. You were part of the great effort, until, oh boy, six months after it was over.
– Tom Hanks
You cannot look up at the night sky on the Planet Earth and not wonder what it’s like to be up there amongst the stars. And I always look up at the moon and see it as the single most romantic place within the cosmos.
– Tom Hanks
My job has always been to hold a mirror up to nature.
– Tom Hanks
For some people, I will be Forrest Gump for the rest of my life. But that’s OK; that’s a good thing.
– Tom Hanks
I went to college because I didn’t have anywhere else to go and it was a fabulous hang. And while I was there I was exposed to this world that I didn’t know was possible.
– Tom Hanks
It’s just as hard… staying happily married as it is doing movies.
– Tom Hanks
The nature of motion capture is only going to work for certain films. It’s not going to put any other type of movies out of business.
– Tom Hanks
Some people are cowards… I think by and large a third of people are villains, a third are cowards, and a third are heroes. Now, a villain and a coward can choose to be a hero, but they’ve got to make that choice.
– Tom Hanks
And I’m not apolitical – I’m very specific in my politics. But a lot of the time it’s nobody’s business unless you’re over at my house having dinner.
– Tom Hanks
My favorite traditional Christmas movie that I like to watch is All Quiet on the Western Front. It’s just not December without that movie in my house.
– Tom Hanks
No journalist has ever been in my house and no photographs have ever been taken of where I live. I don’t parade my family out for display, which is the way it will stay.
– Tom Hanks
I think it’s better to feel good than to look good.
– Tom Hanks
Everybody has something that chews them up and, for me, that thing was always loneliness. The cinema has the power to make you not feel lonely, even when you are.
– Tom Hanks
My doctor said, ‘If you can weigh what you weighed in high school, you’ll essentially be healthy and not have Type 2 diabetes.’ Well, I’m gonna have Type 2 diabetes, because there is no way I can weigh as much as I did in high school.
– Tom Hanks
I think 80 percent of the population are really great, caring people who will help you and tell you the truth. That’s just the way it is. And I think 20 percent of the population are crooks and liars. It’s just a fact.
– Tom Hanks
Never give up because you never know what the tide will bring in the next day.
– Tom Hanks
A hero is someone who voluntarily walks into the unknown.
– Tom Hanks
I will entertain anything; it doesn’t matter. You know, it’s not obviously about the price, it’s not about who, it’s kind of about when and what. It’s material, that’s all.
– Tom Hanks
Truth is, I’ll never know all there is to know about you just as you will never know all there is to know about me. Humans are by nature too complicated to be understood fully. So, we can choose either to approach our fellow human beings with suspicion or to approach them with an open mind, a dash of optimism and a great deal of candour.
– Tom Hanks
Even if a story has nothing to do with my life, if I can recognise something of myself in the character and think, ‘Oh yeah, that’s what I’d do…’ Yeah, that’s what I look for.
– Tom Hanks