Great things that can happen when you're doing a movie.

Great things that can happen when you're doing a movie.

I've done it with Broadcast News-where there was no finish line, there was no agenda that I had to move all the characters to this point, that I was sort of open to what happens.

You become so obsessed, and that's not a bad thing for a movie. Serve it with that sense that it's the whole world.

A lot of things just aren't true any more.

Things get very distorted when you do a movie, weirdly so.

You have more and more people coming into the tent with the creative guys [on Hollywood films]. You have marketing and concept testers, advertising people. What you find gets the high numbers is easily appealing subjects: a baby, a big broad joke, a high concept. Everything is tested. The effect is to lessen the gamble, but in fact you destroy a writer's confidence and creativity once so many people are invited into the tent.