With my horror movies or with this movie [Valley of Violence], same thing. The subtext of this movie is what to take away from it. Plot is never something that's been my driving force as a filmmaker.

There's nothing stopping you from making movies. You can always make and try different things.

One of my favorite scenes of the movie [Valley of Violence] is when Ethan Hawke is sitting at the campfire with the dog.

Of course, we talked about Westerns we like with [James Ransone in Valley of Violence] , but it was always thematically in relation to the movie and what the themes of the movie were.

We've become so postmodern as an audience and we're so familiar with the style of horror movies that they all kind of feel the same. I think if you can do something a little bit unexpected, then you as a filmmaker end up being one step ahead again. I think that's the key.

I think having funny characters is just one way of having three-dimensional characters.

There are people - I think this is why there are so many commercial directors doing well in big studio movies, for whom it's not a personal choice - it's "What's the coolest, most effective way to make them laugh, make them scream?" It's a very calculated approach. And that's different. It's not better or worse. It's just a very different approach to filmmaking. That's always been the case.