I think I took my eye off the ball. From about 2005, 2006, 2007, I was out of it. I thought I could oversee movies and have it done for me, so to speak.
You have to realize I like doing big movies that appear on a big screen. So the visuals and the audio have to be of a certain quality before I start to get excited about the thing.
I want all my films to look distinctly different, like some other directors I admire. But in a way, I can't really take myself completely out of the movies I make.
I'm a student of the movies. I'm a student of all media. This is what I do, and I like to immerse myself in what's current and what's topical. And I find that I'm drawn to those things.
As an actor, the ambition is to play interesting characters. And in the indie genre world, the budgets are low. That allows me, as an actor, not to have a financial value behind my name, to justify me being in these bigger parts for these types of mo...
I think being snobby about the kind of storytelling people do, it just irks me. It irks me. And in fact, it's one of the things that drives me to make as many horror movies as I do.
When I first started acting in movies - as probably a lot of naive young actors do - I made a list of directors that I wanted to work with and sent it to my agent at the time.
I have nothing against these big CGI movies, but there are not enough of the other ones - the ones with stories about character that have a beginning, a middle and an end. I said that to a couple of studio heads and they said, 'That's novel.'
There are these creative shows, all on cable, that are just so daring and out there. That's the stuff I really want to be a part of, like with 'Sucker Punch' and 'Hangover 2.' Those movies didn't hold back. They really went for it.
For the past few years, I was the more visible Asian performer, and I think it gave young girls a kind of role model showing it's possible to actually reach success doing movies.
I was never into the popular school or clique or anything. Then I started doing movies when I was in high school, so then I got popular. Then the girls paid attention to you who didn't before.
I think being self-referential is really narcissistic. Who's to say anybody's even thinking of you that much? But some of these movies that I've done, people still recite lines to me, even 20 years later.
So I've always been kind of an apocalyptic kind of kid, and looking back at the movies I've done, there's some kind of apocalypse in them. So that must be what scares me... besides Republicans.
If you look at the movies that come out, most of them are bad, so it's not as if achieving some level of success means you get offered better roles, because frankly they don't seem to exist.
From what I've been able to determine, many of our big stars are addicted to tobacco. They want to smoke in movies for the same reason I smoked as I wrote, which is that they think their performance is going to be better.
My childhood was influenced by the roles my father played in his movies. Whether Abraham Lincoln or Tom Joad in the 'Grapes of Wrath,' his characters communicated certain values which I try to carry with me to this day.
I'm not sure my books would translate into movies very easily. So rather than have someone do a terrible job, I haven't been willing to sell them.
I have three young children, and I kind of stopped going to movies in 2006. I go to see some, but I'm a little bit out of touch, and I didn't know who Marion Cotillard was.
The movies I watch and the music I listen to and the books I read - those are important to me. It's very important to me, and I don't know what I would do without those things.
You cannot be an actor like I am and not have been in some of the worst movies like I have. But I stand before you deeply honored, mighty grateful and just plain gobsmacked.
I'm less interested in slasher, and go more for roles that can affect you on a personal level. I'm interested in human empathy in the movies I see, and in the ones I am a part of.
