When you're dealing with the world of dreams, the psyche, and potential of a human mind, there has to be emotional stakes. You have to deal with issues of memory and desire.

What I react against in other people's work, as a filmgoer, is when I see something in a movie that I feel is supposed to make me feel emotional, but I don't believe the filmmaker shares that emotion. They just think the audience will. And I think you can feel that separation. So any time I find myself writing something that I don't really respond to, but I'm telling myself, 'Oh yes, but the audience is going to like this,' then I know I'm on the wrong track and I just throw it out.

I never considered myself a lucky person. I'm the most extraordinary pessimist. I truly am.

I don't particularly enjoy watching films in 3D because I think that a well-shot and well-projected film has a very three-dimensional quality to it, so I'm somewhat sceptical of the technology.

What I love about IMAX is with its extraordinary resolution and color reproduction it's a very rich image with incredible detail. It lends itself wonderfully to huge shots with much in the frame. Thousands of extras and all the rest.

I've been interested in dreams since I as a kid and I've wanted to do a film about them for a long time.

I'm very happy where 3-D is going, which is that it's becoming a choice - and thankfully, most people are still choosing 2-D.