Gareth Evans

Whenever you make a film, all you really want is for an audience to connect with it in some way.

I've known a lot of different martial arts before I came to know Silat.

There's nothing more frustrating then when you have someone who's a little bit stiff and you have to ease them into the shoot. When you're dealing with large groups of people, like if you have a fight with 18-20 people and like 5 of those are a little bit stiff, that process of trying to ease them in and be patient and encourage them is hard.

I've always loved the films where it's like you're building up to something, you're getting a drip feed of mystery and tension and suspense, and then all of a sudden you flick the first domino and it just free-wheels until the climax of it. That was something I've always been drawn to.

When it came time to design the action for 'Gangs' I knew that there'd be a level of expectation. What I wanted to do was play into some of the tropes that you would expect from a show called 'Gangs of London.'

I'm nervous about my kids seeing action without emotional consequences. Especially in a movie that might be rated PG-13, but just because it doesn't show much blood. That, to me, is more risky than watching an action movie where you're aware of the characters' pain and suffering.

Good action should tell you things about your characters.

If I try to make something that appeals to everyone it will appeal to no one.

We all have a different moral barometer, whether it is something we are okay with or not okay with. Like I find some things a little too sentimental for my taste when I watch television. If it is too nice it is not good for me.

I grew up watching cowboy movies with my dad all the time.

Sometimes the best television for me is when you see a character do something that you morally disagree with, but you love them so much that you wish you could climb into the TV and stop them from doing it.

I certainly got influenced by Shane Black cause I just love Shane Black's work anyway.

In real life, I balk. Even seeing a real fight, I feel horrible.

I used to run a Japanese review website way back in the day, around about 2003, 2004. It was just my own little personal thing, because I was just obsessed with Japanese cinema.

I have a amazing soft spot for 'Mean Streets' - I just think there's something incredibly raw and energetic about that movie. But I think 'Raging Bull' just shocked me to my core.

The Raid 2' was always the project I really wanted to make, and it had been in my head for three years at that point. If I'd gone off to pursue something elsewhere I would have had to cast it aside, and I would have regretted that forever.

Pulse had the rights to the 'Gangs of London' game and they wanted it to be a film franchise. One of the things about London is you hear between 10 and 15 different languages, and we wanted to explore the diversity of the city.

Every martial art shares similiar things. There's only so many ways you can throw a punch and a kick but the way you package it, the way you present it... that's what makes each one unique.

When people look too perfect, it's not cool.

I'm not interested in big-budget films, I'm interested in something a little more personal.

I want to make sure that whatever I do is the right thing and something I believe in.

I just don't know how to make a PG-13 movie.

I want to do an American crime gangster movie.

The film 'After Life' by Hirokazu Koreeda. I remember when I first saw it, just being totally blown away by every single frame of it. The honesty of it, the fact that it celebrated life, the fact that it was so unbelievably profound and spoke volumes about living life to the fullest and cherishing every moment.

I think a lot of people have become quite disenfranchised with action films, especially when they hide the choreography with quick cuts and close-ups.

It's true. In hotels I do always look at what you could rip out to use as a prop. The nicer the place, the more I want to destroy it.

I loved, like really, really loved, the humor in Jason Eisener's 'Alien Slumber Party.'

In Indonesia we have quite a strict censorship law, so there's certain things we're just not allowed to do, and there's certain things we have to restrain ourselves from doing.

I couldn't see myself going back out to make 'The Raid 3.'

I want to do a Yakuza movie.

For me, 'The Raid' was survival horror. It had thriller elements, tension elements, gunfire, martial arts, and action - throw all of those things together and see if they can fit well. All of those things played a part.

Merantau' was my attempt to infuse drama with martial arts. It was a bit of a mixed bag for me. I'm super proud of it but I can see the strain of some things in there too. It was our first film.

I enjoy watching superhero movies.

I used to use Twitter and I had to get off it because every morning it was like I'd wake up, and the first thing I'd do is reach for my phone, click on it and check the timeline.

I have family and friends who are religious, they don't wear it on their sleeves as part of their souls, but I see the beauty of what that religion does for them.

When I was in Indonesia I had made a short horror film called 'Safe Haven' for the 'V/H/S/2' anthology with Timo, a friend of mine. When we did that it was a real fun experience, it was a taste of what it's like to make something in the horror genre.

Basically, when it came to 'Apostle' there were a number of factors that led me to make it.

The benefits of shooting in Indonesia, we are very independent from union laws.

All of my consumption of films when I was a child was on VHS. I saw films in the wrong aspect ratio, with mono sound, on a tiny, square television, with a terrible side speaker, and I was still totally immersed in films like 'Evil Dead 2' and 'The Godfather.'

Once 'The Raid' one and two had come out, as great and wonderful as those films were for me creatively, it became a thing where I was like 'Action? No.'

The problem is I have this thing when I do a film, I really want to give all of myself to it. Commit 100 percent to the vision on it. I can't do that in a studio environment.

I didn't want to be, like 'the action guy.' Not that that's a bad thing, it was just I knew that I wanted to try my hand in different things.

There's this thing of, before I started making 'The Raid' films I was just obsessed with all different genres and just loved cinema. Then when 'The Raid' came along, 'The Raid 2' came along, it was an opportunity for me to have a chance to get into the industry.

Comedy strikes a fear in me like nothing else.

I'm going to keep myself open in terms of genres.

When people talk about this idea of being a Welsh guy from the Valleys who travelled off to Indonesia to make martial arts action movies, on paper, it sounds really bizarre. But because everything happens in real time for me, it's just been a smooth process, it hasn't been weird.

Whenever we have a set piece in like 'The Raid' or 'The Raid 2,' it was about getting the audience along for the visceral ride of it.

Growing up either from classes or watching movies I knew, of course, about kung fu, karate, aikido, Muay Thai... But the first time I saw Silat was when I was working on that documentary - the first time I properly saw it. I was just struck by the fact that it looks so different from other martial arts.

I can't go to a restaurant or a hotel now without looking at the architecture and wondering how it would look if a character jumped off something - or crashed through it.