I try to live with honor, even if it costs me millions of dollars and takes a long time. It's very unusual in Hollywood. Few people are trustworthy - a handshake means nothing to them. They feel they're required to keep an agreement with you only if you're successful or they need you.
My mother was a housewife but she was also an artist. My father was an electrical engineer.
I blame it on Walt Disney, where animals are given human qualities. People don't understand that a wild animal is not something that is nice to pat. It can seriously harm you.
Inspiration can hit you in the head at any time in any context. It could happen in a conversation. Talking to someone at a party, you can get an idea. But you've got to remember those inspirations.
The Jacques Cousteau shows actually got me very excited about the fact that there's an alien world here on Earth.
There are many talented people who haven't fulfilled their dreams because they over thought it, or they were too cautious, and were unwilling to make the leap of faith.
I certainly didn't think of myself as gifted. The standards for being gifted in my environment were if you were good in Little League or if you were good in football.
I don't use film cameras. I don't do visual effects the same way. We don't use miniature models; it's all CG now, creating worlds in CG. It's a completely different toolset. But the rules of storytelling are the same.
You have to not listen to the nay sayers because there will be many and often they'll be much more qualified than you and cause you to sort of doubt yourself.
I lived in a small town. It was 2,000 people in Canada. A little river that went through it and we swam in the - you know, there was a lot of water around. Niagara Falls was about four or five miles away.
I watched a couple of really bad directors work, and I saw how they completely botched it up and missed the visual opportunities of the scene when we had put things in front of them as opportunities. Set pieces, props and so on.
If you set your goals ridiculously high and it's a failure, you will fail above everyone else's success.
I feed on other people's creativity, photographers, artists of every kind. Sometimes a feeling that you get listening to a song can be so powerful. I've wanted to write whole scripts around what I felt just listening to a piece of music. I think music is important, and surrounding your visual field with stimulating things.
I love short trips to New York; to me it is the finest three-day town on earth.
There is a hugely underserved population out there... those who are the least capable of paying pay the highest.
