I don't do drugs, and so music very much gets me going. When I do something, I think, "If it was a piece of music, what would it be?"

I've done collaborations in all my movies, and I think it's part of what I enjoy about the process. This kind of intimacy that you create. Because it becomes very intimate.

I very much enjoy my freedom creatively but I also would love to make one of those big Hollywood films that costs a lot of money and has a lot of people running around with cell phones and all that insanity.

In "Drive," there's a heightened male edge. In "Only God Forgives," it was almost crawling back into the womb of the mother. And now with "The Neon Demon," being reborn as a 16-year-old girl.

You must understand that violence in a movie is only a tool. If it's used badly, it will be horrible. If it's used correctly, it can be very interesting. But, essentially, it's just a tool.

Film works when a director and a star have a connection. You know, when there's something telekinetic between them, there's a partnership, it's like alter egos. It's like James Stewart and Alfred Hitchcock, or Fellini and Mastroianni. I'm not comparing, I'm just saying, if you can come into a relationship where the director and star have such a bond, it's so much easier to make a movie.

I don't know if power seduces less or more. I think power is a constant evolving mechanism that, since the dawn of time, on one level corrupts and on another level does not. But I think, no matter what, mutates.