Acting for me, is a passion, but it's also a job, and I've always approached it as such. I have a certain manual-laborist view of acting. There's no shame in taking a film because you need some money.
A financial shift happened with 'Facing the Giants' and 'Fireproof,' where movies that were faith-based films were profitable. And people in Hollywood - like people in downtown U.S.A. - are out to make money.
If I want to, I can sign 20 films for ridiculous amounts of money, but I really want to do different kinds of cinema. I want creative satisfaction.
We had two cameras, so they could turn it on and shoot as much as we wanted. You don't have to worry about wasting money on film. A lot more takes are possible.
I think there's only one or two films where I've had all the financial support I needed. All the rest, I wish I'd had the money to shoot another ten days.
Whereas money is a means to an end for a filmmaker, to the corporate mind money is the end. Right now, I think independent film is very confused, because there's excess pressure in the marketplace for entertainment to pay off.
I've never done work for money ever. If your choices are based on grosses and the film doesn't do well, what does that mean? It leaves you with nothing.
The hardware manufacturers, game designers, cable companies and computer companies and, in fact, film studios are going to ensure that this thing marches on. They know that they are going to make an enormous amount of money from it.
They put all this money into these huge films and then no one goes to see them. That sort of shows they're out of touch. Then everyone in town passes on my little movie and it does really well.
I'm a real nature lover, so whenever possible, I like to get to the beach or get to a forest or get somewhere there's fresh air. Apart from that, I'm a film addict and a DVD freak.
I can work in films as long as the story doesn't have a realistic nature. If I'm working with an allegory, a fantasy, it can be developed in synthetic terms.
I'm an actor that likes to go to work. I like going to work every day. I'm a worker by nature. I'm not someone who does one film a year and feels satisfied by that.
I think empathy is a beautiful thing. I think that's the power of film though. We have one of the most powerful, one of the greatest communicative tools known to man.
I think books, novels and autobiographies have a power to touch people far more personally than films do, so there's a bit more of a responsibility when you then dramatise it.
There's no doubt in my mind that 'Slam' is going to be huge. It's a film about the power of language. People are going to see this and get blown away.
My husband. He keeps me grounded. If I were in the world on my own, it would all be much more seductive. But I'm in a relationship that has nothing to do with the film world.
One of the reasons I loved working with Tom is people feel they know who he is... I think working with an actor who the audience already has a relationship with actually helps you in a film like this.
Many times an actor is stuck for the lack of choices. The same happened with me when I started my career. That was the time when mainly romantic films were being made, and that is what I was offered all the time.
The whole idea of genre and categorising films is a critic's construct. For me, I just try and make stories and see where they go, but there's nothing wrong with horror; there's nothing wrong with romantic comedies.
If I were given a choice between two films and one was dark and explored depraved, troubled or sick aspects of our culture, I would always opt for that over the next romantic comedy.
You can tell a lot about a man from his hands. If they don't have any scars or calluses on them, you might as well assume they cry at romantic comedy films, too.
