It's the difference between hunting a lion and hunting a deer. If someone hunts a lion, it's like: "Wow, they're brave!" But if they're hunting a deer it's like: "That poor deer!" I know that. I know that guys getting killed is horrible but people have seen it before. You've seen The Evil Dead. With girls, it's like: "I don't want to see that happening..." I know that.

Natural disasters are terrifying - that loss of control, this feeling that something is just going to randomly end your life for absolutely no reason is terrifying. But, what scares me is the human reaction to it and how people behave when the rules of civility and society are obliterated.

I love movies that are just straight-up exploitation, but the ones that endure and the ones that last are the ones where the filmmakers put in that extra level of thought; after 25 years you put them on in front of an audience, and they'll respond to it and enjoy it.

I generally follow my own compass and make films about what's scaring me.

Everybody has to know where they're coming from, what they're doing, why they're doing it, who they are. These are essentials.

So when I was beating the guy, I started thinking, 'What if I was Hannah Montana?' . . . And little do they know that that's why I look so insane . . . I'm torturing myself with thoughts of, 'How could I actually pull off being a high school student and a pop star at night?'

As a kid, I was the neighbourhood baby-sitter - very responsible, always in charge.