I found there are a lot of advantages to being on a small budget and having a small crew. You get some very intimate performances and naturalistic cinematography.
Gareth Edwards
Development is the first phase. People write a script, you get concept art. You get to a point where you get a green light, which is basically a production company saying they're going to put the money up to make the movie. Then you go into production.
One of the things you do, when you have a scene or whatever it is you're doing, I replay that scene in my head and pick different positions to watch it from in my head.
I feel like one of the most successful heroines in science-fiction cinema is Sigourney Weaver in 'Aliens' - I love her, and as a guy, no part of my brain thinks of her gender.
Peter Jackson was very good to me after I made my first film, he was really one of the best things that happened after that movie. I was invited to New Zealand to go hang out with him on 'The Hobbit', and so for two weeks I got to sit next to him and watch him direct, and it was the most amazing experience you could ever have.
Being such a fan of 'Star Wars', the dream is to be able to add something to the equation and bring something to the table like Death Troopers and ships.
Yeah, I love Ewan McGregor, I think he's phenomenal.
I think the second you rule anything out is the second you end up doing them and then you look like an idiot online. Honestly, I feel like I got my dream, I got to make 'Star Wars'.
I like jumping around perspective. It keeps things alive and makes you realize that your personal perspective on anything is very misleading and it's real hard to get a real sense of anything.
I like jumping to perspectives that aren't necessarily part of our characters, like suddenly you're in a window, looking from someone's house.
It's a great Disney tradition, isn't it? For every single character to die in all their movies.
My earliest memory of actually definitely wanting to be a filmmaker was when I got thrown out of class when I was 10 and I was storyboarding a short film I wanted to make with my friend's camera.
I've always wanted to do it. I know a lot of people say that, but I really did want to make films, even when I was a tiny little kid.
Especially in television, when you do visual effects, what you're predominantly doing is trying to add value to TV shows that otherwise don't have any.
I hate love stories, personally. I'm not a fan of them. I absolutely loathe romantic comedies, with a passion, and I really worry when people use the word 'romantic' when they describe the film.
So when you make a disaster movie that is trying to say something about our world, you reach for images that haunt you.
You have to strike a balance between imprinting the film with your voice, and trusting these amazing, talented people you've hired to do great work.
Some people get really worried about non-actors, but I think you can get brilliant performances out of people.
For ages I thought I'd wasted my career doing visual effects, I wanted to be a filmmaker. And then I've learnt at the end of it all that actually visual effects was probably the best training ground I could have had.
So your job as a director is to constantly try to stay at the steering wheel and pull it hard left or hard right. To try to give it a voice.
I consumed Spielberg movies when I was little.
I like grey, not black and white. Even the bad creatures, you want to give them a moment where you empathise with them. You realise that what they do isn't so evil.
There's a side of me that wants to rebel, and as soon as you go down this path with a movie, and you're supposed to go right, I want to go left, just to see what it's like. I just want to do it,because the more I know you aren't supposed to do something, the more I want to do it.
All great films have stories attached to them of how horrific they were to get made.
I take my 'Star Wars' quite seriously. There's humor in the movie, but as a fan I just wanted it to feel real.
I know when I was 9 and 10, I was watching films way beyond that age group, and it's what kids aspire to.
I spent 10 or 15 years doing visual effects and, if I learned anything from that time, it's that you do the best work when you let things go wrong and embrace the happy accidents. Then suddenly it feels fresh and you're somewhere new.
It's such a marathon making a film - two-and-a-half years, at least - and every day, you do something that in any other lifetime would be one of the highlights of your life.
But you know, 'Star Wars' is the movie that's affected me the most in my entire life. It's the reason I wanted to become a filmmaker, and you've got this amazing opportunity to play on that field.
Star Wars' is so rich and it seems crazy that everyone's, like, a white male guy. That's due to the 1970s and the fact that it was shot in Britain, but I was very lucky: I'm British, I grew up in England, and I got to see myself represented in a film.
I came through the ranks of the BBC documentary department. I was lucky working during this drama doc era, where they did reconstructions, basically like cheap drama made by the factual department.
In a drama, the camera doesn't exist. In a documentary, it does.
I think some people get confused between development and pre-production. In pre-production, you know all your dates.You know when you're aiming to release the film. You've got your script. You've got everything sorted.
