My conception of it was that in a normal film you have a story with different movements that program, develop, go a little bit off the trunk, come back, and end.

When you've written a movie, you then get together with a whole lot of people and make it. In many ways, I think it is far nicer to be with people rather than being completely solitary.

I'm less comfortable making American movies because I don't know them so well.

For me, the filmmaking has to be about the dramaturgy.

Initially with The Butcher Boy, there was this kid growing up in this strange, weird environment that I remember from when I was a kid. And Patrick's vision was so complete there.

If movies have to satisfy every possible quadrant before they're even made, they're dull. You only get great things when people overreach themselves.

I just got back from New York, and I realized in New York, it's very difficult to hear a New York accent. It's almost impossible, actually - everybody seems to speak like they're from the Valley or something. When I grew up, you could tell what street in Dublin someone's from by the way they talked.