With the first 'Hatchet,' I had an epic battle with the ratings board. They kept giving the movie an NC-17. There is absolutely no way that movie should have gotten an NC-17. All the gore in it is so ridiculous and over-the-top that you can't take it seriously.
When you go to Best Buy and see a DVD of your movie, you think it's amazing. But then there's a whole other world that comes with it. It's a very small percent that's difficult, stalker-like, or annoying. Most people are just so gracious and so nice. As cheesy as it sounds, that's the thing that really keeps you going.
When I wrote 'Hatchet,' I knew that I was not re-inventing the wheel. That was never my intention. My goal was to make an '80s-style slasher flick that actually holds up. Basically, I wanted to make the movie that I wanted to see and pay no mind to current trends or conventions.
Wes Craven's 'Shocker' is one of my favorite soundtracks. I don't know where that movie stands in the critical eye of cinema, but it was a really fun movie because of all the bands that were part of it.
The honest truth is no, I don't feel like I arrived. I don't feel like I'm worthy. My publicist says I'm not supposed to say that, but I don't feel I'm there yet.
I was lucky enough to have an older brother who shared the splatter flicks with me, and I had parents who were cool and involved enough in my life to allow me to see them. I think my folks appreciated that I looked at these movies as a creative outlet... almost like magic shows, if you will.
I think when you're a director, it's hard to do something unless you're absolutely over-the-moon in love with it. The audience, they spend 90 minutes with it, but for you, it's anywhere between a year and a half to three years of your life, every day, working on it.
I think metal and horror definitely go hand in hand. Even when you go to a horror convention and meet the fans, nine out of 10 times if they're not wearing some sort of horror shirt, they're wearing a shirt with a metal band on it.
I once pitched this show that was just like 'Quantum Leap,' in terms of the set-up, and I got a pass because they said 'Quantum Leap' didn't work, even though it was on for six or seven seasons. You can't say 'Quantum Leap' didn't work!
As a writer, Chris Columbus was a big influence. 'The Goonies' was the first movie I ever saw that kids speak normally and not imagined how kids would talk. Always a big fan of Chris Columbus' dialogue and storytelling.
A movie with nothing but violence is not a good movie. But one that is actually entertaining around the horror is one that people will remember and watch again and again.
To all the other dreamers out there, don't ever stop or let the world's negativity disenchant you or your spirit. If you surround yourself with love and the right people, anything is possible.
'E.T.' was the movie that made me want to make movies in the first place, and it was the first movie that made me focus on writing instead of what happens in the movie.
My earliest memories of horror are 'Friday the 13th Part 2,' John Carpenter's 'The Thing,' 'Halloween,' 'An American Werewolf in London,' and 'A Nightmare On Elm Street'... and 'Hatchet' is so obviously inspired by those films that I may as well have made it in 1984.
Hollywood is a roulette wheel. Each project dictates what's going to happen for you next, and it doesn't really matter that your project is critically acclaimed or won awards or has fans worldwide. It's a matter of how many movie tickets and DVDs and on-demand movies that you sell.
