From my point of view, when I was thinking about the prospect of [Michael Douglas] in this part, I wondered if he would go all the way with it. The reason I was concerned is that, oftentimes, actors - especially movie stars - when they're playing a character who might be perceived as unattractive or eccentric, will wink at the audience while they're doing it.
Curtis HansonIt was just a wonderful experience, one for the memory book for sure. The sad thing about it was that the picture came under this absurd cloud of controversy. Here was a movie based on the central theme that racism is something that is taught, and it's illustrated by this story of a dog and the efforts of humans to re-train it after it had been trained to go after black people. And it created this ridiculous controversy and wound up being the last Hollywood movie that Sam [Fuller] made.
Curtis HansonI love suspense movies, because in a sense they're the most dreamlike of any genre, and I'm sure I'll make another one.
Curtis HansonMy very first professional writing credit was on a movie called The Dunwich Horror, and Roger Corman was the executive producer.
Curtis HansonBad Influence, which is an early movie of mine that I'm very fond of. It was an unhappy experience when that picture got released, because it coincided with that ridiculous Rob Lowe videotape scandal.
Curtis HansonThere was a long period of time when Sam Fuller had a lot of projects fall through and had a lot of difficulties getting a project off the ground. And I was able to observe him during that period, and see his incredible resiliency and courage as he faced this difficulty and just kept working.
Curtis Hanson