What you care about [movie] is whether it's moving you, or whether you're caught up in it.

Even though L.A Confidential box-office was a fraction of, say, Titanic or the Grinch movie, it finds its audience and will continue doing so for who knows how long, because of the basic thing we love about movies, which is storytelling and performances.

So it's discouraging and, yet, when you make a movie like Wonder Boys, in a sense it's its own reward, because it does move people, it gets great reviews, and it becomes part of that library of movies that exist out there. As time goes by, it will find its audience.

I love suspense movies, because in a sense they're the most dreamlike of any genre, and I'm sure I'll make another one.

Most scripts are so linear and simplistic in their plotline.

I very much had wanted to do a picture with more humor than what I had been allowed to do earlier, which is what attracted me to Wonder Boys so much. I found it funny in a very serious way, which is the best kind of comedy.

Samuel Fuller pictures were both written and shot in such an unusual way that his voice came through loud and clear, and it made a big impression on me.