As a kid, my idols were Sam Raimi and Peter Jackson, and I get into crazy races with myself. Raimi was 21 when he made movies, and when I didn't get 'Cabin Fever' made that fast I thought I'd failed.

'Cabin Fever' was very much inspired by 'The Thing.' It's really a perfect guy's horror movie: There's no love story, it's just straight-up horror. And it's so well-done. It moves at a slow pace, but it's really terrific.

I love historical movies. I want to make a violent medieval epic.

When I was 22, I had this horrible psoriasis outbreak. It was all over my legs, I couldn't walk because my legs were cracked and bleeding. Weird things like that can happen to your body.

Some disaster movies look like you're watching someone else play video games. They're fun but it's not real.

It's just assumed that a horror sequel is going to be bad. It's never going to be as good as the first one.

I love movies that are just straight-up exploitation, but the ones that endure and the ones that last are the ones where the filmmakers put in that extra level of thought; after 25 years you put them on in front of an audience, and they'll respond to it and enjoy it.

I think that many people are ashamed when they feel afraid. There's this thing in our society that you're not allowed to feel scared. You have to be a man and put on a brave face, but we all have fears.

I've always been fascinated by the idea that there's no such thing as evil; it's all in your point of view. To one group a suicide bomber is the antichrist and to one he's a hero.

When you make a film for a million and a half dollars and it opens at 20 million, the next question out of everyone's mouth is, 'When's the next one, when's the next one, when's the next one?'

I need to eliminate 'like' from my vocabulary. I begin sentences with, 'That's seriously like... ' I hear myself talking in this Los Angeles high-school student kind of way, and I hate it.

I like to take risks and do weird things and stuff that's not normal compared to other Hollywood movies. Not stuff that's totally avant garde and daring, but doing stuff that's in other languages and not using stars and using real people - things that they generally don't do in mainstream films.

'Eraserhead' is a weird, horrible nightmare, and it doesn't narratively make sense. Stuff's happening, but you honestly feel like you're in a nightmare, and it has such disturbing imagery that it stays with you forever once you've seen it.

When people direct insults at me, I can take it.

What's important for me is staying healthy.

The one negative to horror is that it's always law of diminishing returns. When you go in the funhouse, the ride is never scary the second time. You will never have that pure experience as when you first watch it.

My phobias worsen as I get older. I'm scared of flying, driving. I'm terrified of sharks. I'm a germaphobe. But I try to face my fears; I do. Well, most of them.

There's fear in everything, but we can't just succumb to that. We have to suppress it, so we get used to suppressing fear to make it through the our day. Otherwise, we'd become paralyzed by them.

I get a little too obsessive with work.

I have so many different projects, I hear voices in my head - the characters talking all at once - and I have to write to make them stop.

There's a crazy, false notion that audiences are not patient or will not watch a story, that you have to put in a scare every ten minutes. But I always thought that was insane.

I feel like in the '90s, horror just lost its way and everything became so safe and watered-down.

I'd love to see us get to a point where you can make a movie and not worry about the limits of the violence. Then I think they'd get so violent that people would get bored of it.

I've always dreamed of having a year-round haunted house.

When I go see an R-rated horror movie, I want lots of violence.

People want to be disturbed when they go see a horror movie.

You know, the dirty secret in the Director's Guild is that the average life expectancy of Director's Guild members is 57 years old. The stress level is so high and directors are generally really out of shape, cause they sit in the chair and they eat craft service.

Anytime you make a movie, the goal is a wide theatrical release, with the right distributor.

You know, the best thing you can say about a horror film is, 'Don't see it.'

Horror audiences don't need to see some TV actor they're familiar with.

Much of my youth was spent in the parking lot or inside a Dunkin' Donuts.

If someone gets up and walks out of the movie, it means it's really affected them.

As a kid, I was the neighbourhood baby-sitter - very responsible, always in charge.

Horror movies are the best date movies. There's no wondering, 'When do I put my arm around her?'

As a director, you have to know what actors are doing. You're the one telling them what to do. The actors' job is to come prepared to the set, but sometimes, if they're beginning actors or people who are non-actors, you have to teach them how to act.

I look at careers like Ben Stiller and think that's a great career to have where you're doing movies that you write and direct, and also act in films, although he's primarily an actor.

Horror is like comedy. Woody Allen's comedy is going to be very different from Ben Stiller's comedy which is going to be different from Adam Sandler's comedy which is going to be different from Judd Apatow's comedy. They're all comedy, but they're all very different types and you can enjoy all of them. Horror is the same way.

I have no tattoos. There's nothing I've even been that into to get a tattoo of it.

Natural disasters are terrifying - that loss of control, this feeling that something is just going to randomly end your life for absolutely no reason is terrifying. But, what scares me is the human reaction to it and how people behave when the rules of civility and society are obliterated.

Movie stars need to retain some of that mystique if you are a big movie star.

Everyone is so terrified of being labeled a racist.

I think filmmakers, in general... There are some awesome, really great filmmakers - but on the whole, filmmakers, actors, I think they are the biggest bunch of whiny, over-paid babies on the planet.

One of the great joys of life, now that you can afford a nice suit, is getting one for free. That's why I like to do press tours - I always say making movies is just an excuse to get free clothing.

Look at comic books. It used to be something that only geeks were into. And now it's everywhere.

I think characters are most terrifying when they're relatable. It's best when your most horrible characters make sense, and are believable. That's when a movie is most terrifying.

Believe it or not, but I was a camp councilor for three years. I love kids.

I have control issues. For sure, no question.

Even post-WWII, nobody talked about the Holocaust. It wasn't until the '50s that people started talking about it.

I would love to do a musical!

I love movies. I mean, I really, really love movies.