It is better to develop ideas with friends rather than the usual route of having a great idea and throwing it out into a production, and being surrounded by professionals who've been doing their jobs for years.

Sometimes an actor doesn't sell an idea 100 percent. It just sounds like something that's coming out of their head. You can hear the gears whirring and they're trying to think of what the smart approach is to getting a line across.

I don't let technology and mechanics hinder me from a good time. During one of a film premiere there was a party in the other room; I needed to get to it, so I got out. I escaped. Sometimes you do what you can, you'll turn on your best John Maclean and get to it.

There's something within contemporary culture which is far more faux masculine than it was when men were really men.

I saw how you could get away with such a free-spirited, naturalistic sensibility in a mainstream Hollywood movie, and you could apply a lot of the skills of the '70s icons that I really admire to a contemporary, commercial movie.

I love animals. With animals you never know what you're getting. Everybody says don't mess with animals and little kids in movies but those are the funniest things because you can't be in control. I like to lose control as a director.

Sometimes in the studio movies I've been working in, you'll put a joke in a movie because the crowd loves it - not because I love it.