You have to be careful of the advice you take.

I was in a cult for thirty-four years. Everyone else could see it. I don’t know why I couldn’t.

It takes me awhile to find something that I'm passionate about. I'm reading a lot and thinking a lot, and torturing myself a lot because I'm feeling really guilty for not writing something today.

If you make a film and then two and a half, three years later, suddenly the country's changed and you look like you just happened to hit it. I actually like being contrarian. I would have preferred to come out three years ago when everyone was disagreeing with me. But hopefully it asks a lot of questions about our responsibility in sending young men and women to war, especially a war that's so complex, where there's no right answer, where they're forced with impossible decisions every day.

Usually the characters are where I start. Then I continually ask myself, 'What's the worst thing that could happen to this character?'

We give you characters we'd feel very comfortable judging, and then go: 'Oh yeah? Watch this'.

When I started to allow the characters to go where they wanted to go, I just had to follow.