All those awkward moments - that's on the cast for doing such an amazing job. I think it was funny on the page, but when they did it, you definitely went, "Oh!" Watching it with a crowd that, like you said, was not expecting it to be funny, but then genuinely finding it funny, is totally a credit to their performances.

In general, I go to see the stuff that for me is, "Thank God for that actor, he's doing something that I never imagined; thank God for this filmmaker, because if this person didn't exist, this movie wouldn't exist." That's why I go to the movies. That, to me, is what's so exciting about this movie.

As filmmakers, the Western is a historic, cool thing to be a part of once in your life.

I always feel like the less you say when you're making a movie, as a director, is the best. That means everything's going great.

It is a very classic Western [Valley of Violence], and if you like Westerns, you'll like this movie, but there's a tone to it that's all its own that I think is unique and memorable.

It's very important to me to find ways to relate the audience to the characters. This is the first thing to go in most mainstream horror films.

Sometimes I look at it [Valley of Violence] and go, "How did we do that?" But it's a credit to Ethan [Hawke], he had done White Fang, so Ethan is like, "Oh God, that's right."