There's always somebody you can call and go have lunch with and just talk out an idea. And it's great, because I need that. It's part of my writing process, to early on sit people down and say, 'Alright, this film I'm working on...' and I tell them everything I have.
— Jeff Nichols
When I saw the scene in 'Close Encounters,' and Richard Dreyfuss's son is screaming at him - that's a heartbreaking scene. And I remember being devastated by 'E.T.' Or when E.T. started to get sick. That broke me up a little bit.
Sometimes as writers, we try and put narrative development above character development. We try to move our characters around like chess pieces that do our bidding. The problem with that is sometimes the characters do things they shouldn't do. Things that are inorganic.
You can watch any Hitchcock film and be blown away.
I like scripts. I spend a lot of time writing them.
I'd love to just continue making original films from scratch, but it doesn't mean I won't try my hand at something else in the meantime.
Write dialogue that supports the situation and the characters, as you find them.
As a director, you see something in someone; you know it's there, you just got to go get it. You do that with any actor. That's your job.
I outline and outline and outline, and then I'm very specific about the stuff I write. That's my process.
People ask me about past projects I've worked on, and other things; I'm just really bad at lying. I have a bad poker face, so I just try to tell people how I'm feeling in the moment and really what I was trying to do.
We have a problem with dealing with race in our country. We have a problem with dealing with marriage equality and equality in general. These are complex, divisive issues in our society, and I think that the only way we further this conversation is to take them down to a very human scale.
The films that have influenced me most are: 'The Hustler', 'Badlands', 'Hud', 'Tender Mercies', 'Cool Hand Luke', 'A Perfect World', and 'Laurence of Arabia'. I also really like 'Fletch'. I feel like all of these films reached an honest place in regard to the human condition while also stringing together really entertaining stories.
I found filmmaking to be a very practical art form. It's about figuring out how to create within the very practical limitations/constraints of time, money, and large groups of collaborators.
'Midnight Special' is, like 'Starman', a government chase film - in the government chase film genre - about a boy who has special powers and the government agents' quest to find him.
My connection to 'Aquaman' came out through the Sony hack. It had no relationship to reality. I was not on that film. I was not hired to work on that film. I had been talking to Warner Bros. about it.
There are great advantages of making things on the independent market. There's freedom and control there, and kind of a cleanness to the process that I like.
I've been really lucky when it comes to casting kids, and I don't particularly like child actors. Too often, they just show up, and they've had whatever real innocence that's in a child just beaten out of them. They start to perform for you, and you can just see it coming. It's no good.
I'm a director because I directed a movie. And if I have any advice for people, it's, 'Go write something; go direct it. If that's what you have a desire to do, go do it. If the movie stinks, just put it on the shelf and try to do it again.'
I think only the movies you do remember are the films you had an emotional connection to.
I've kind of always had this balance between genre and personal dramas. It almost feels like the two help each other. If I was just to make a genre film, maybe it would be hollow and soulless. If I was just to make a personal drama, maybe it would be melodramatic and nobody would ever go see it.
One of my favorite directors is Clint Eastwood, and I hear about the way he works, and I think I'm of a similar style. Very few takes - you get what you take, and you move on. It's very much a job and work.
I don't think 'Shotgon Stories' or 'Take Shelter' have hopeless endings. I think there's hope in both those films, no matter how hard you have to search for it. It's there.
I had two DVDs my junior year. One was 'Fletch' and one was 'Goodfellas,' and I watched those movies so much. I just remember eating Ramen noodles and watching 'Goodfellas.'
It takes people being alone in front of the computer at three in the morning to write opinions about movies, apparently.
I'll be honest: 'Badlands' changed my life: it really did rewire my brain as to how film can operate.
I think it's important to say typing in the computer is like the last, last phase of my writing process. That's kind of the fun part. Well, it's all somewhat fun, I suppose. But usually what happens is I think about a movie for at least a year - maybe a couple more - and I don't put anything down.
I know how to write a movie. I know how to direct a movie.
Marriage isn't about a collection of scenes over ten years of two people telling each other that they love each other. It's about commitment.
Financing for 'Shotgun Stories' was initiated with money from close friends and family. This is where the money to go into production came from. After production, a company called 'Upload Films' came on board and provided post-production funds and services. In both instances, people were taking a gamble on us.
I want all of my films to be grounded in reality, and I think 'Midnight Special' is the most grounded film I've ever made, in spite of its genre.
I've been just unsuccessful enough not to have been given a big opportunity too soon.
I have gained a lot of confidence in my process of making films. It does't mean I'll make a successful film or even a good film, but I know how to make my film.
I'm really calculating when it comes to these scripts - I'm really calculated about character behavior and dialogue.
Your whole life is changed with that first child. Your social behaviors are all turned upside down, you're sleep deprived, but eight months in, my son had this seizure, and it just woke me up to the idea that, oh, no, this can end. And it can end in a way that will destroy you forever.
It took me a year just to edit 'Shotgun Stories.' Actually, it took me two years to edit 'Shotgun Stories.'
My characters are not thinking about the act breaks. They're thinking about what they need to do to move forward. As long as I focus on that, the story starts to progress. As soon as I think, 'We're 20 pages in, something better blow up,' we're in trouble.
'Indiana Jones' was me growing up. I could quote lines from 'Tango and Cash' as much as I could quote lines from 'The Searchers'.
Steven Spielberg had a tremendous influence on me through his early stuff. 'E.T.', 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' - 'Jaws,' I think, is one of the most beautifully directed films ever.
'Take Shelter' is a tough movie because there's no humor in it, so there's really no way to judge how you're doing - whether people are still with you or not.
Sometimes you'll write while listening to a piece of music and think it's great, but then you'll go back and read it without the music and go, 'This sucks.'
Making movies is really hard. It's a very complex process, with many, many variables.
I first read 'Tom Sawyer' when I was in 8th grade, 13 years old. I realised since that Mark Twain just bottled what it felt like to be a child.
I think Warner Bros. are probably some of the best people in marketing films in the world.
With 'Midnight Special,' the sound was used as a narrative construct. The audience is looking in one direction when a sound suddenly erupts from the other direction.
Marriage is tough. I can tell my wife all day long that I love her, but it doesn't mean anything if you don't show that.
I was always interested in creative writing growing up. From junior high on, I was writing short stories. I also grew up watching movies. My father would take me to everything. Most weeks, I could open the paper having seen every movie listed.
I loved, in 'Starman', the use of anamorphic lenses, the creation of blue light, and Carpenter's use of the widescreen format.
It's amazing how far you can get into a plot before you figure out what you're doing.
We have so many films that we can fit into the slate a year, and we spend $100 million on those films in order to make $400 million dollars. We don't spend $20 million in hopes of eking out $40 million.
Most film productions, when they're based at a place, they get, like, a 30-mile radius or a 30-minute radius to get out of the town. And once you go past that, your day starts to become shorter, and you have to start paying your drivers more, and everybody just gets paid more, and you have less time to shoot, and everything costs more.
