I guess you don't make any franchise movies unless the fans are there.

If I know what my finale is when I'm writing a screenplay, then I don't always have to chart out every scene before that. I can adequately find my way. I'm experienced enough to do that.

You hear people say that there's too much CG in movies today, but CG is what allows me to take a green-painted wall in a studio and make it disappear, and then put 100 miles of landscape in. CG, in the right hands, can be a marvelous tool.

Damn, my first cut that I showed to distributors was probably about two hours and 20 minutes, even though my contract said two hours. So, I had to lose 20 minutes. It's incredible that it just keeps happening.

When you do a studio picture, all the paperwork and legal stuff is already taken care of!

Strangely, I always have a lot of cut scenes. I keep writing shorter and shorter scripts, thinking that this time, I'll get all my scenes in.

I don't want to have so much humor [in films] that it undermines the jeopardy, but enough to sometime relieve tension.