Negativity is the enemy of creativity.

Sometimes I get an idea for cinema. And when you get an idea that you fall in love with, this is a glorious day.

Every viewer is going to get a different thing. That's the thing about painting, photography, cinema.

I like cappuccino, actually. But even a bad cup of coffee is better than no coffee at all.

I love paint. I like watercolours. I like acrylic paint... a little bit. I like house paint. I like oil-based paint, and I love oil paint. I love the smell of turpentine and I like that world of oil paint very, very, very much.

This whole world is wild at heart and weird on top.

I like to make movies in Texas because that's where I learned how to do it. I know the industry there, I know the people, I know the crews. But it's hard to make films in Texas.

There is a palpable sense of history in the homes that I choose to occupy. I think that's one of the reasons I gravitate towards old homes: I really like that sense of history and that sense that I am one step in a very long process that trails out in both directions around me - before me and ahead of me.

I try to live my life with grace and through grace even though I don't particularly believe in the divine - and that's a direct result of my having been raised Catholic.

A great sense of morality was instilled in me through my upbringing in the Catholic faith - particularly because my father is a moral theologian. And morality is something I believe exists separate from faith, as an intrinsic human quality that one should aspire to understand and participate in.

The image of a bedsheet ghost standing all alone in an empty house was something I was obsessed with. I really wanted to make a film about that image, and I was waiting for the right story to come along. When it did, I did my best to honor that image.

I make movies to be watched the way I want to watch them, and I want to watch them in movie theatres.

I want to live a very positive and optimistic life that has a wonderful outlook on the future and the impact that I will have on the world and the people around me.

It's something that you pick up at a history class in college, the idea that history and time is something to which we can't even hold a candle to. We, as human beings, are just a small element in the overarching sweep of narrative history. That really had a profound effect on me, that realization.

'Ain't Them Bodies Saints' wound up becoming a love story even though it was not initially meant to be one.

I learned to not separate writing, shooting, and editing, it's all sort of one big mess of creative output.

I love films that are more random and chaotic, finding moments and capturing them.

The films I love are very precise, and every shot means something; every shot should convey something new.

I love animals and their behavior. I watch cat videos all the time.

One of my biggest regrets is that I didn't finish college.

I grew up in a deeply Catholic home. Our parents always encouraged us to march to our own drums, though, so some of us are still Catholic and some are not. That's always going to be a part of me though; little bits of it trickle into my work. Whether it's an embrace or a rejection, I'm not always sure, but I can't avoid it.

I certainly did not envisage making a Disney movie. The most I hoped for was to be able to pay my bills. I was not a go-getter. I was very type-B.

In my darkest moments, I have not eaten an entire pie, but I have turned to other baked goods to find solace.

I don't think I'm the best screenwriter in the world. It's just important to me to write my movies so I'm personally invested in them.