I'm drawn to villains that are three-dimensional and raw and that I can kind of see in my own life.

I listen to music cinematically. I think about music and how it would make me feel when it's put to an image, a moving image, and I love it.

There is something beautiful and permanent in the world, and that is the love that a person can have for another human being.

The guy who kills 38 people is not the guy you'd want to have over at Thanksgiving.

My heroes are Robert Duvall, Forest Whitaker, Ed Harris, Tommy Lee Jones, Anthony Hopkins and Sean Penn.

I hate to use this as a metaphor, but making movies is kind of like going to war. It's not - but the stamina required and what it takes to tell a story that is this big in scope, you need a general that will bring out the best in you.

I take it as a real compliment that people believe that I can in some ways mine the disenfranchised, the marginalized, the somewhat off-center - psychologically speaking - people in our society, and bring a real humanity to them, and make people see what would otherwise be a person that you would hate. Find a reason to love them and see the world from their point of view.