I was listening to a lot of Norwegian black metal and death metal. There's a great history to Norwegian black metal. That music is very dark and violent, but it's also beautiful.

I just always loved mythology, ever since I was a kid. Greek mythology was something I remember learning about in fourth grade, and Egypt, too, and something about both those things just clicked with me. I just thought they both were so beautiful and interesting to learn about.

The main thing for me is just the length of time it takes to make a movie. It's at least a year of just talking about it, talking about it with yourself or your director or your other castmates or the press, so you just want to make sure it's a film that although you initially feel this pull or this drive to it, you don't really have the answers to why you're drawn to it. But it's more about not knowing the answers to certain questions but wanting to go on the journey of discovery to find the answers.

One of the reasons I love making movies is because it's an opportunity to share with the world a different way of being or a different way of living or seeing the world. If it's something you've already seen before, if I have too many reference points for it, then it's not exciting for me to make.

Instruments fascinate me because they're completely awkward. When I picked up a guitar for the first time I was like, "What is this?" because it's so foreign and unknown.

Clothing totally changes my perception of how I feel about myself depending on what it is that I'm wearing.

I have a sister and her name is Mimsy, like from "Alice in Wonderland," so we've got some strange names in our family.