James Wan
It's pretty scary to know how quickly time flies.Collection: Time
For me, the sound design and the musical score is a big part of what makes scary movies work.Collection: Design
'The Exorcist' is one of the finest movies ever made, and it just so happens to be a scary movie.Collection: Movies
Language-wise, my mom and dad's dialect, they're pretty obscure. It's Chinese, but not your traditional Chinese, like Cantonese or Mandarin. It wasn't something that I got to use very much growing up. We eventually just spoke English around the house.Collection: Dad
I'm a big movie fan, and I want to make movies in every genre. I want to make my romantic comedy one day.Collection: Romantic
I'm terrified of the supernatural things, which is why I'm very grateful that I don't see things like that. Because if I did see things of the paranormal persuasion, I don't think I'd be able to continue making scary movies.Collection: Movies
Whatever it is that makes your movie unique is something you should embrace.
I think before 'Saw' came along, there really wasn't a movie franchise that actually went out there and said, 'We're going to come out with one every year during Halloween and make that our trademark.'
I think what 'Saw' did was really open up a huge branch of lots of these other movies that ultimately retroactively gave the first 'Saw' somewhat of a negative reputation.
I'd love to be a filmmaker and look back and be like, 'Ah, man, we were part of that whole '80s video nasty thing!'
I grew up loving X-Men, Spider-Man and Batman. Those are obviously the key big ones, but there's always something kind of cool about Aquaman still, the idea of creating a huge world that is on our planet.
I love Carpenter, I love Craven - these are all the classics - the Romeros of the world, but I think the biggest influence on me as a storyteller and as a filmmaker is actually Steven Spielberg. I love that even though Steven isn't known for being a horror director, he started out his career making scary movies.
If I have free time, I want to go to the beach, walk around a shopping mall, go grocery shopping. Live a little bit of life.
There's a reason why Smellovision has never really taken off. And I think it's a good thing.
Supernatural movies generally have a much more brooding pace. If you look at films like 'The Sixth Sense' or 'The Others,' it's more building up the characters and building up the situation as opposed to just opening with a big action set piece.
If you don't do the suspense correctly, then your jump scares are not going to work.
If you care about the characters, then whatever scary thing happens to them, you feel it even more.
The size of the budget doesn't make that much of a difference because the kind of issues I have on a low budget film I I have on a big budget film as well, but they're just much bigger.
For me and my films, I want my audience to experience cinema in its full glory. It's not just visual, it's audio as well. It's emotional, and I want you to be engaged with not just the scene but with the characters.
We think craft is important, and the irony has always been that horror may be disregarded by critics, but often they are the best-made movies you're going to find in terms of craft. You can't scare people if they see the seams.
I'm a big fan of cel animation, I'm a big fan of computer animation, and, most of all, I'm a big fan of stop-motion animation.
The size of the budget doesn't make that much of a difference because the kind of issues I have on a low budget film I have on a big budget film as well, but they're just much bigger.
What I realized is that it doesn't matter how big or small your film is. The actual filmmaking process, the actual storytelling, it's still the same thing. It's still all about creating characters that you like and creating moments that get you excited or get you tense.
I am a student of cinema, and I love filmmaking of all kinds.
'Death Sentence' really is a throwback to the '70s style revenge drama with moments of action. It's like a contemporary 'Death Wish' with a much more thriller style storyline, but the action scenes I shot very much in the style of '70s films like 'The French Connection.'
Critics tend to be very hard on the horror genre.
I guess, deep down, there's a dark side to us. I guess that's why movie fans really love the revenge drama. We like to go into dark movie theaters and fantasize.
I definitely love to be scared. It draws the primal side out of you.
'Insidious 2' is a direct continuation of the first movie. We literally pick up from where we left off at the end of the first film. And whereas the first movie is a twist on the haunted house genre, the second movie is a twist on the classic domestic thriller.
What's funny is, when I made 'Saw,' I got accused of being a fascist, when I made 'Insidious,' I got accused of being godless, and now I made the 'Conjuring' films, and I'm accused of being too much God.
I'm a big fan of suspense and tension filmmaking, and that was my goal with 'The Conjuring.'
A lot of these types of films - the vigilante or revenge drama - were so popular in the '70s because there was a feeling in the culture of loss of control.
Not many people realize this, but I'm a really squeamish guy. When I watch other horror films that are really over-the-top with their blood and guts, I cannot watch it.
Whether it's a popcorn movie or some really intellectual sociopolitical movie, I think to some degree they're all influenced by the social climate that we're living in.
I love 'MacGyver.' I do!
I took a break from horror; I made three ghost movies back-to-back-to-back.
I guess I have a fascination with the idea of puppeteering. I think, in a lot of ways, directing is puppeteering. I guess I see a lot of analogies between what puppeteers and filmmakers do.
I see my actors as my collaborators.
I grew up loving X-Men, Spider-Man and Batman.
Isn't it crazy to think that we've explored space more than we have explored the depths of our ocean? That just fires up my imagination about potential sea monsters and cool creatures, that kind of stuff.
We all live in some kind of home, so the idea that our home could be invested with a supernatural entity is kind of frightening, I think.
I didn't direct any of the 'Saw' sequels, but people thought I did.
With 'Insidious 2,' I wanted to push a potential franchise in the direction I thought it should go in.
Not many people remember this, but in the first 'Death Wish' film, Charles Bronson doesn't actually go after the people that hurt his family: he just goes after every punk. He just blows them all away.
People are so used to seeing John Goodman as a lovable dad or the quirky characters he played in the Coen Brothers films.
With all the crap that's going on around the world, you kind of want to do what you can to protect the ones you love.
I think that the first 'Saw' was really more of a psychological film about two people stuck in a room, and the traps and games that fans seem to embrace so much now were quite a small portion of the film.
All my movies are about people with some ideology, but guess what? It never works out.
When I was a kid, my grandfather used to watch Bollywood films. There's a lot of colour and vibrancy to the Indian films.
'The Conjuring' was a massive success, and honestly, it set the bar quite high. So I was nervous about making the sequel, and I wasn't sure if it will still have the same impact as the first one did. But that's what moved me to make the sequel.