I think that if you're a good enough actor you hope that eventually the material will find you.

Eventually, in the editing movie you have to look at it as if you hadn't written it. So, you have to be a bit more brutal.

I had a bad experience on Ned Kelly, which I'd written the screenplay for. I thought: "Well Jesus, if these are the type of people directing movies I might as well direct one myself!"

The thing with America is that... however you want to denigrate them for being crass or whatever, with a film that they like and think is well written, well-made and is popular, they actually want to work with those people and want to follow that, whereas I've had nothing coming in from the UK... nothing at all. Whether that sums up the state of the industry now, I don't know. But it's strange.

I think that if you're a good enough actor you hope that eventually the material will find you.

I like Quentin Tarantino, especially the early films, but I'm a big fan of Billy Wilder and Preston Sturges... you know, people were writing great dialogue back then. It's as if people only have the memory of the last 15 years. So, before Tarantino no one was writing witty dialogue? That's ridiculous. Why do we have to keep referring to Tarantino?

I can't compete with the Michael Bays of the world in regard to special effects and that kind of stuff. But you can compete in the dialogue and the one liners and the original characterisations and I think that's what people are responding to.