I don't love horror movies with something surreal happening. That doesn't work for me. What's terrifying is something that could actually happen to me and what I would do. I don't know how to throw a punch, and I've never had to do it.

I worked with the same producer from The Freebie, my cinematographer was one of my shooters from The Freebie. I was really aiming to tackle a genre, but sorta tackle it in my own way, and put my stamp on it, and the way that I like to see movies made.

There is something really nice about learning that you can take the reins of your life and your career. There are a lot of times, doing what we do, that you feel no control and get very panicky feeling. It's nice to know that you are able to do it on your own.

You can't sit there and feel bad for yourself and say, "But, it's just not coming to me." That's an instinctual thing to do because that's the way the business normally works. But, when you've got a good brain on your shoulders, I think you can make it happen.

[It is nice] to explore someone's will to survive, the ferocity of loyalty, how far you would go to protect the ones you love... I believe women have more power than we give ourselves credit for... We have been known to lift cars off of babies! That's incredible.

It's really fun to go back and forth from acting projects to directing projects. You don't have as much responsibility when you're acting, but you have more fun. But then you miss having that responsibility, and so you go back and torture yourself and make a movie.

I think part of what makes someone a great actor is being able to walk into a situation emotionally available and open, and have all your guards down, and just have that level of trust and security in yourself to know that you could walk out on that limb with someone else and be safe.

By the time you are in your thirties, most of the time, you've got a job, you can pay for your rent, you can create this nice world around you. And still, you're only in your thirties - you're not that far away from your twenties, which is when you're making all of your stupid mistakes.

I'd like to make mistakes on my own dime and not have a herd of people tell me what I'm doing wrong. and I'm also still trying to find and develop my voice as a filmmaker, and I think that's easier to do on your own terms than trying to satisfy a bunch of people that are paying for the movie.

The director of 500 Days of Summer is doing the Spider-Man movie. That's not necessarily the movies I want to make, but it's all about the story, and if you connect to the story, and you feel you can tell that story better than anyone else, then great. Jon Favreau killed Iron Man, I loved it.

I get very nostalgic for times and places and experiences, but I have a wonderful group of core friends and family who I love and adore, so I don't mourn the loss of any particular friendship. I think they're all part of a path, and the ones that really mean something are still important in my life.

I think there are certain tenets set in place for all different types on genres. For thrillers, women usually die first. I can't say exactly why, and it's kind of a bummer... But I also can't explain why the wallflower girl in the romantic comedy always gets the guy in the end. That's just the way those movies go.

What I get really excited about are movies that I connect with emotionally. 'Deliverance' was on TV, and they don't really make movies like that anymore, just simple and scary. The truly scary thing is, 'I'm going to threaten your life, I'm going to threaten the people you love. What are you going to do about it?'

It took me a really long time to decide who I want my circle to be and who I want to surround myself with. Once you make that choice, that is where I feel like I have built my strength. This is my life choice. These are the people that make me feel good about me, and that I love and adore and will do anything for.

As an actor, you're lucky if you get a month before a project starts. There are times when you get a day before a project starts. So to be able to really sit and inhabit that mind and the story is really beneficial, and it really helps for me to be able to then compartmentalize as we're shooting and detach and go somewhere else.

I came to filmmaking as an actor looking for great characters and great opportunities, both of which are kind of hard to come by. It turns out I really love the process. And, it's exciting to be able to take my career by the reigns and make things happen for myself. Hopefully, in doing so, more opportunities will become available to me.

I'd like to make mistakes on my own dime, and not have a herd of people tell me what I'm doing wrong. and I'm also still trying to find and develop my voice as a filmmaker, and I think that's easier to do on your own terms, than trying to satisfy a bunch of people that are paying for the movie. That being said, I'm certainly open to moving into that world.

The Freebie cost virtually nothing. We funded the movie ourselves, people got paid, but were mostly paid in the back end, we used one of the cheaper cameras we could get. The movies have a look to them, you can sorta point out the really low-budget movie. So even if the heart of the movie and the story are really, really great, they always sorta feel a little cheap.

It takes no prisoners. We had to completely change wardrobe for the girls because we had summer wardrobe set and it was so frigidly cold while we were shooting. And the bug population was through the roof, that summer. It was just silly! The fact that we even survived at all is shocking. The fact that we came out of it with a movie that I really like is awe-inspiring.

When you start using more expensive cameras, everything around it gets more expensive, which is something we hadn't necessarily taken into account beforehand. Your lighting package gets way more expensive, and then coloring it is going to be more expensive. So I think all of that will essentially be cushioning our camera package. Budgets beget budgets, and expenses beget expenses.

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