Taika Waititi

Anyone who has a parent can relate to this idea of not quite understanding who your parents are or making up stories about them.

A set should be like a family, except that you all actually like each other.

I'm not interested in doing work that doesn't captivate me.

Films that are easy to sell happen to be the worst films. Look at the poster for 'Wrath of the Titans' and 'John Carter': they're exactly the same. You could switch titles.

The ridiculous events in everyday life are often overlooked - people don't recognise it as potentially cinematic.

'Eagle vs Shark' was about keeping myself sane. I wanted to go back to my comedy roots with people I trusted and had worked with before and do something low-budget and more experimental.

Within the family unit, you have people you grew up with who are supposed to be your brother, father, or your mother who are almost like strangers and acquaintances.

We all have to remember that New Zealand is built on these kind of people who are rebels and renegades, people doing it their own way, fighting for freedom, and braving the elements. I think it's cool to celebrate that.

I think everyone has experienced those boring arguments about whose turn it is to do the dishes.

I think something that every actor wants, whether they've done four movies or forty movies, is they want to find the work interesting. You want to come to work and think this is going to be a challenge.

With some actors, you can tell, just from their different backgrounds and their different approaches to working, they would have just a natural conflict, just a sort of friction.

My job is to express myself.

I don't think there's much tolerance for people who are a little different or withdrawn or quiet. They always seem to be the ones who stick out the most, the ones who want to just shy away and withdraw.

I find that a lot of child actors are ruined once they've done a job.

The thing for me is that 'Thor' was an indie film that just had a few more zeros on the budget. At heart, it is just a simple story about a guy trying to get home to deal with someone who has broken into his house. It's just 'After Hours,' but set in space.

Not every person can be an artist: we need people to run stuff.

Actors are terrible at overthinking things before they turn up to work, and they decide on a way they're going to do it, and then it's hard to break them out of it.

When I became a film-maker, all my favourite films, they weren't comedies.

Unfortunately, there aren't enough interesting acting roles in New Zealand to sustain a career.

I daydream all the time.