Rian Johnson: The overwhelming reaction on set was everybody loved the...

If you make something interesting, inevitably not everybody is going to like it.

Rian Johnson

something-interesting ifs interesting

I do think that I'm a big believer in having an idea or having ideas and just tucking them away in the back of your brain. Even if you aren't consciously thinking of them, I think they simmer. You're working on them, even if you don't know you're working on them, and I think having something in your head for a while is a valuable thing.

Rian Johnson

brain ideas thinking

I mean, the first “Back to the Future” is kind of a perfect script, I think. In terms of handling time travel the best, it depends on your definition. To me, that means it effectively uses it in the story.

Rian Johnson

perfect mean thinking

Writing sucks. I think it's terrible. Writing is not fun, and don't trust anyone who claims to enjoy it. Liars!

Rian Johnson

liars writing fun

You go from these high hopes when you're writing to just a desperate want of not making a complete fool of yourself by the end of it.

Rian Johnson

fool want writing

Hopefully with each thing that you do you're learning something, you're growing, and you're pushing yourself a little harder in some way or another. So I think you'd be in real trouble if each new thing that you create didn't feel like 'Oh, wow. I feel like I'm doing something a little different this time.

Rian Johnson

different real thinking

I do love science fiction, but it's not really a genre unto itself; it always seems to merge with another genre. With the few movies I've done, I've ended up playing with genre in some way or another, so any genre that's made to mix with others is like candy to me. It allows you to use big, mythic situations to talk about ordinary things.

Rian Johnson

use ordinary fiction

Much of directing [a movie] is not directing but just listening and being present in the moment and just keeping your eyes open.

Rian Johnson

moments eye listening

I feel like people want to be surprised when they get out of the movies. They want something thrown at them they didn't expect. They want stuff that reminds them of the feelings that you get when you're watching art house movies but with the fun of like a big summer movie. That's the goal, I guess.

Rian Johnson

summer fun art

I just don't think CGI is up to manipulating the human face yet. I feel like you can get away with it with aliens or monsters or something that's intentionally foreign, but I have yet to see anything digital to do with the human face that doesn't just look ridiculous.

Rian Johnson

monsters looks thinking

Teen movies often have an unspoken underlying premise in which high school is seen as less serious than the adult world. But when your head is encased in that microcosm it's the most serious time of your life.

Rian Johnson

adults world school

You come out of each movie just thinking, "God, if we can fool them into letting us make just one more, we can get it right."

Rian Johnson

just-one fool thinking

Unlike some of the time-travel movies I love, like 'Primer' or '12 Monkeys,' 'Looper' is not about time travel. It's about this situation that time travel creates and the people dealing with that situation. So narratively, the big challenge was to have time travel get out of the way.

Rian Johnson

monkeys challenges people

Then I saw it. I saw a mom who would die for her son. A man who would kill for his wife. A boy, angry and alone. Laid out in front of him, the bad path. I saw it. And the path was a circle. Round and round. So I changed it.

Rian Johnson

mom boys son

Even if I had $200 million, I’m very wary of overusing CGI. I think it’s a great tool and it can be used really effectively, but I feel like it does tend to be overused and especially in sci-fi stuff.

Rian Johnson

tools doe thinking

I'm a sci-fi fan, and I guess you have to let go of some of that at some point, and realize that as long as you're focused on telling a story that you care about, at the end of the day, that's what really matters, even to hard-core sci-fi fans.

Rian Johnson

the-end-of-the-day letting-go long

Back before 'Brick,' I wrote a short film that I never ended up shooting: hit men in the present who work for a mob in the future who send their victims back in time. A guy is sent his future self, he lets him run, and the whole short was them chasing each other across the city. That sat in a drawer for 10 years until after I made 'Brothers Bloom.

Rian Johnson

brother running men

You never want to make a "message movie," but you always want to be talking about something that you care about.

Rian Johnson

care want talking

All my favorite movies are somebody else's least favorite movie.

Rian Johnson

my-favorite

It's best if I stay out of future plans and let time go on.

Rian Johnson

if-i-stay future-plans goes-on

The overwhelming reaction on set was everybody loved the porgs. And I love 'em, so you know what? I get it if people are a little wary of cuteness in the 'Star Wars' universe, but I personally love them, and I think they have their place in the movie.