I read every screenplay that was being sent to the other directors. None were being sent to me, but I was reading what others were choosing and what the best writers were writing.

I feel very strongly about the legacy of Ghost and I'm the next part of that chapter and hopefully a very long and continuing story through the franchise of Ghost in the Shell which is already a huge universe. So yes, I felt pressure, but you always feel pressure as an artist creatively in any endeavour you do, so you just have to do the best that you can do and then hope that is successful.

I think you can get away with being a bit more political in science fiction.

Well, I wasnt just kind of standing in a queue at McDonalds and someone sat down and said, Youre the director of a $100 million Hollywood movie. Ive been working in commercials for ten years.

So when it was my turn to start developing projects, I knew the writers I wanted to work with, and I had met every head of studio, every executive and a lot of producers. I started finding things, little crumbs off other people's tables that I would make my own.

I went to America with a very specific idea of what I wanted to do.

You've got pressure making any film, frankly. Whenever you're doing something in the public eye you have to silence it really, you can't read the blogs and take them at face value, you just have to say, 'I'm lucky enough to be in this position, to do this job'.