Gore Verbinski

It's a mistake for Hollywood to impose themselves on the gaming space. Not only is it arrogant, but it hasn't really worked.

I think comedy is drama, often. It's hard to have comedy over a period of time - commercials are one thing, but over a period of time - comedy and tragedy go hand in hand.

When I speak of drama, I'm really referring to just 'desperately trying not to be ordinary'. Trying to get something that has a little bit of friction, conflict, absurdity.

There is a sense that animated movies are suddenly a genre. I just don't believe they are; it's a technique to tell a story.

I'd love to do a PG-13 animated adventure. It would be great.

I always wanted to do an animated movie. I find it to be incredibly liberating as a way of telling a story.

If you imagine yourself as a craftsman at ILM, you spend your days tumbling buses and animating shards of glass. You're doing a lot of visual effects work.

Nothing's occurring in animation - you manufacture everything.

I think people imagine going back to a time when they knew who they were and they knew what the circumstances were - if you screwed up it was your fault.

Drama is drama, and it's really... if it's something small, you put a magnifying glass up to it; if it's something big, you use a wide lens.

My respect for artists is very high. I think to get the most out of them, you have to liberate them. I think part of liberating them is saying, 'Come up with something brilliant, new, and fresh. Stop thinking based on what has been beat into you by executives or publishers in terms of what's going to work and what's not. Don't react, just act.'

All the traditional westerns are about choice and the individual. When progress comes it's much more difficult to define the individual in that world.

My respect for Westerns have gone way, way up. It's hard and treacherous work. It's hard to find people these days who can ride horses like that and jump onto trains.

On a live-action movie, things happen that are unexpected. In animation, you have to fabricate the feeling. That takes a tremendous amount of nuance until the film becomes sentient and gives back.

For me, some of the happiest moments on a live-action film are the awkward moments. One actor says something to another actor. They didn't expect that performance from that actor; that affects their return performance.

My respect for animation has gone way up. It's a truckload of work. I have to sit with my animators the same way I'd sit with my actors and cast them.

I just don't know when we all decided that if it doesn't fit in a Happy Meal box, it's not for kids. I remember flying monkeys in the Wizard of Oz, and I grew up watching Monty Python. I think that kids can handle a lot more than we give them credit for, especially when it comes to the absurd.

Today we're just growing and consuming, and I think maybe there's a sadness in that. People are longing for a time when there was a black and white and good and bad.

Animation is a technique, not a genre.

I think audiences ultimately want something new. I think the business model for a franchise is such that it's very low risk because you have data and studios love data.

Honestly, every person, every individual has a process, and my philosophy, whether it's an actor or an animator, is you try to understand the process that person has so you can get the most out of them, but I think you have to sort of manipulate that process with honesty.

I think you can never ever lie, ever. If you don't know, say, 'I don't know'.

My respect for animators and animation directors has gone way, way up and it is just not something you can phone in.

I think when you get people who are really talented and you take them out of their comfort zone, you get a lot more out of them.

Reading in a sound booth seems very strange. Everyone has a process they are comfortable with; this was uncomfortable for me.