It's funny, because I don't think of my films as "slow-burn." I don't even know if I was familiar with the phrase until people started labeling me with it.

The movie [ The Innkeepers] is in no way a comedy, but I would put some of the funny scenes up against some of the funnier comedies this year. I think it's genuinely really funny, but it's out of the gallows.

I like movies that leave things in the hands of the audience.

I'd been all hyped about it, I was like, "Please come," and to have that and know Tommy Nohilly is probably going like, "This is cool," it makes me feel good.

I don't really get that nervous about whether people like it. You can't do anything about that. It's more technical. You spend two years of your life obsessing, picturing sound details, and you work so hard to make a movie a certain way, that you get there, and you're like - is it loud enough or whatever, so that this experience with everybody in this room is the fairest chance I can get. And then if you like it, cool, and if you don't, whatever.

I did the movie [Valley of Violence] from two perspectives. You're with Ethan [Hawke] the whole movie, but for the first half, you're really with Ethan. For the second half, you're with him, but also you're with the bad guys because he kind of becomes the bad guy. No one's really good in the movie.

If you make just a straight scary movie, people are just - you don't know what they're thinking.