I want my audiences to be as open-minded as my characters.
I don’t want to make films that give you the answer. If there is a message to my films – and I hope there isn’t – it’s to be open-minded.
Everyone wants to be loved; everyone wants to know where they’re going in life; everyone wants to have a sense of direction and feel the next day is going to be better than today. We just all deal with it in a different way.
Being the son of a filmmaker, you are aware of a career as a director. You don’t think of it as just movies, but as a life.
Creating a wonderful drama is an art form, while comedy is just entertainment.
I really enjoy theater. I just went to see ‘Death of a Salesman,’ and it knocked me on my ass.
I have one of the original ‘Ghostbusters’ guns in my house.
I find nice people kind of boring.
I don’t know why I’m drawn to anti-heroes, but I certainly am.
I’m really specific in the way that I shoot. I’ve always had a very good sense of what I need in the editing room.
I am an obsessive flyer, myself.
I always believed that you can make challenging films, but they should be fiscally responsible.
Yeah, I was born in Montreal and I go back to Vancouver and Toronto a lot, so I have a sense of being Canadian, and I was raised by two Canadians, and my wife is Canadian, so yeah, I feel it.
With each one of my films, I’m exploring one of my own issues and I try to expose myself a little in the film.
Doesn’t every generation feel like the one that’s coming up behind them doesn’t know how to grow up? I’m not sure if we’re progressively getting worse or if your perspective shifts.
If someone else made ‘Up in the Air’ or ‘Thank You For Smoking’ or ‘Juno,’ I would have wanted to rip their head off. I need that same sort of passion for every project I take on.
When I write a film, all I think about is where the thing ends and how to get the audience there.
I hate movies that tell people what to think. I’m proud that Democrats thought ‘Thank You For Smoking’ was their film and Republicans thought it was theirs. I’m proud that pro-choice people thought ‘Juno’ was their film and pro-life people thought it was theirs.
When you’re young, you want to make every kind of film: musicals, Westerns, horror. Slowly you begin to hear your own voice. I hope people receive what I do as small, personal films that are somewhat contrarian about their main characters.
And the biggest improvement I see between ‘Up in the Air’ and ‘Juno’ and ‘Thank You for Smoking’ is that ‘Up in the Air’ deals with the complicated human stuff in a way that my other films have not. It’s a more articulated film, and because of that, I’m most proud of it.