WILLIAM FRIEDKIN (Director), at 16, began working in the mailroom of a local TV station in his native Chicago, and within months had worked his way up to studio floor manager. In less than a year, he was directing live broadcasts, and not long thereafter, was handling network dramas and musical shows. Friedkin's most formative experience as a filmmaker nevertheless remains his work in documentaries, primarily for producer David Wolper in the late 1960s.
After varied apprentice steps as a feature director, working on such films as Sonny & Cher's "Good Times" (1968), "The Night They Raided Minsky's" (1968), Harold Pinter's "The Birthday Party" (1969) and "The Boys in the Band" (1970), Friedkin directed his critical breakout film, "The French Connection" (1971), for which he won an Academy Awardâ for Best Director.

Friedkin's next film, "The Exorcist" (1973), set the seal for his place as one of the leading talents of his generation. He followed with "Sorcerer" (1977), which over the past quarter-century has won a devoted cult following, after which he made the critically acclaimed "The Brinks Job" (1979), "Cruising" (1980), "Deal of the Century" (1983), "To Live and Die in L. A. " (1985) and "Rampage" (1987), which he wrote and directed.

In the mid 1980s, Friedkin worked in television, directing "C. A. T. Squad" (1986) "C. A. T. Squad: Python Wolf (1988). In 1990, he took a fresh stab at the big screen horror genre with "The Guardian" and later, in 1994, he directed the sports film "Blue Chips," followed by the erotic thriller "Jade," in 1995. His Showtime/MGM remake of "12 Angry Men" (1997) was nominated for six Emmys, and in 1998, he made his debut as a director of opera, with Alan Berg's "Wozzek" in Florence, Italy, with Zubin Mehta conducting. Finally, in 2000, he directed the critically acclaimed "Rules of Engagement. "

RICARDO MESTRES (Producer) began his industry career at Paramount Pictures in 1981 as a creative executive for Don Simpson and Jeffrey Katzenberg, for whom he later supervised the development and production of the international box office hit, "Beverly Hills Cop. "
Mestres joined the Walt Disney Studios as a production executive in 1984, where he oversaw such successful films as "Outrageous Fortune," "Three Men and a Baby," "Good Morning Vietnam," "Big Business," "Cocktail" and "Turner and Hooch," among others. In 1988, Hollywood Pictures was formed, and Mestres was appointed president. Under his management, Hollywood Pictures released such hit films as "Arachnophobia," "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle," "Tombstone," "The Joy Luck Club," "Quiz Show" and "The Santa Clause. "
Mestres became a producer in 1994 and received his first screen credit on Francis Coppola's "Jack," starring Robin Williams. His other credits include "101 Dalmatians," "Flubber," "Home Alone 3," "Reach the Rock" and most recently the French comedy "Just Visiting. "

JAMES JACKS (Producer) was executive producer of the Coen Brothers' cult film "Raising Arizona" before joining Universal Pictures as vice president of acquisitions. During his 5 years there, Jacks was involved in making such films as "Field of Dreams," "Do The Right Thing," "Darkman," "Jungle Fever" and "American Me. "
After rising to the position of senior vice president of production, Jacks left Universal in 1992 to form a partnership with Sean Daniel. They founded Alphaville, one of America's most successful independent production companies. Together, Jacks and Daniel have produced "Dazed and Confused," "Hard Target," "Tombstone," "Mallrats," "The Jackal," "Michael," "A Simple Plan," "The Mummy," Sam Raimi's "The Gift," The Weitz' Brothers' "Down to Earth," "The Mummy Returns" and, most recently, Jerry Zucker's "Rat Race" and the action adventure, "The Scorpion King. "
Upcoming in theatres for Jacks is Ron Shelton's "Dark Blue" and the Coen Brothers' "Intolerable Cruelty," and his future projects include "Walk Like A Dragon," "Red Cell" and "John Carter of Mars. "

DAVID & PETER GRIFFITHS (Executive Producers/Screenwriters), are brothers, who originally hail from England, and have become one of Hollywood's most sought-after screenwriting teams. Most recently, they collaborated together on "Collateral Damage," the thriller starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

MARCUS VISCIDI (Executive Producer) is presently producing "Wicker Park," starring Josh Hartnett and Rose Byrne. Prior, he produced Tom DiCillo's "The Real Blonde," starring Matthew Modine, Daryl Hannah and Catherine Keener. He previously collaborated with DiCillo on "Living in Oblivion" and "Box of Moonlight" and recently produced DiCillo's forthcoming "Double Whammy" with Denis Leary and Elizabeth Hurley. His other feature credits include Horton Foote's "Courtship," Daniel Petrie's "Rocket Gibralter," "Signs of Life" and "Bed and Breakfast. " Viscidi produced "Mad Love" with Drew Barrymore and Chris O'Donnell, and the film version of Lanford Wilson's "Lemon Sky," which won the special Jury award at the Sundance Film Festival.
Viscidi's other credits include the American Playhouse production of Katherine Anne Porter's "Noon Wine" and Eudora Welty's "The Wide Net. " He also produced Keith Reddin's off-Broadway play "Big Time" and "Honour," which received two Tony nominations and starred Jane Alexander and Laura Linney.
Having once served as the executive assistant to Sam Cohn at International Creative Management, Viscidi was an ICM agent before entering the field of film production.

SEAN DANIEL (Executive Producer) is a partner with James Jacks in Alphaville Productions based at Paramount Studios. Among the movies Alphaville has produced for Paramount are "Rat Race," " Down to Earth," "The Gift" and "A Simple Plan. "
Daniel was also a producer on "The Mummy," "The Mummy Returns" and "The Scorpion King," the Nora Ephron, John Travolta comedy "Michael;" the western, "Tombstone;" Richard Linklater's acclaimed high school movie, "Dazed and Confused;" and famed action director John Woo's first American film, "Hard Target;" among others. For cable, the company has produced the TNT Original Film "Freedom Song" about the birth of SNCC in Mississippi, directed by Phil Robinson, and the USA Network mini-series "Atilla. " Upcoming films include "Intolerable Cruelty," written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen starring George Clooney and Catherine Zeta-Jones, and "Dark Blue," directed by Ron Shelton starring Kurt Russell and Ving Rhames.
Daniel received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the California Institute of the Arts and began his career with Universal Pictures in 1976 as an assistant. Two years later he was promoted to vice president of production. Between 1984 and 1989 he served as president of production for the motion picture group. At Universal he supervised such films as "National Lampoon's Animal House," "Coal Miner's Daughter," "Missing," "Fast Times at Ridgemont High," "Gorillas in the Mist," "The Breakfast Club," "Fletch," "Brazil," Field of Dreams" and "Do the Right Thing. "
Daniel has also been a participant in the debate about media and culture, appearing in The New York Times, and as a guest on "The McLaughlin Group" and "Which Way LA. " He is also a member of the Hollywood 9/11 committee.

ART MONTERASTELLI (Co-Producer/Screenwriter) makes his screenwriting debut with "The Hunted. " Monterastalli previously made his mark in television, serving as executive producer of the series "Tiimecop," "Total Recall" and "High Incident. " He was supervising producer of "Nowhere Man" and served as a creative consultant on "Moon Over Miami. "

CALEB DESCHANEL, ASC (Director of Photography) first stunned moviegoers with his photography for "The Black Stallion" and "Being There" He went on to receive consecutive Academy Award® nominations in 1983 and 1984 for "The Right Stuff" and "The Natural. " In 1982, he made his directorial debut with "The Escape Artist" starring Raul Julia, Griffin O'Neal and Joan Hackett. He also directed "Crusoe" starring Aidan Quinn, and multiple episodes of the television series "Twin Peaks. "

Deschanel next photographed "Fly Away Home" in 1996, garnering an Oscar® nomination for Best Cinematography and nomination for Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography by the American Society of Cinematographers. He then shot Forrest Whitaker's "Hope Floats," "Message in a Bottle," and most recently, won accolades for his lush camerawork on two epic productions: "Anna and the King" and "The Patriot," for which he received an Academy Award® nomination and won an ASC Award. His forthcoming projects include Richard Donner's "Timeline" and Mel Gibson's "The Passion. "

WILLIAM CRUSE (Production Designer) has art directed several Paramount films including, "The Hunt of Red October," "Clear and Present Danger," and "The Rules of Engagement. " Other production design and art direction assignments have included "The Green Mile," "Rush Hour 2," "Murphy's " Fallen," "Forget Paris," "Basis Instinct" and the thirty-hour mini series, "War And Remembrance," for which he won an Emmy award.

AUGIE HESS (Editor) previously worked with William Friedkin on "Rules of Engagement," "Jade," the television adaptation of "12 Angry Men" and the terror classic "The Exorcist. " He has also worked extensively in high-profile television editing for such shows as "Chicago Hope" and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. "

GLORIA GRESHAM (Costume designer) is an Academy Award® nominee for her work on "Avalon" and this is her third film for director William Friedkin. She began her career in New York theatre as an assistant to some of the top theatrical designers, and her first solo credit as a film costume designer was for "Urban Cowboy. " Most recently, she has worked on "The Kid," "Bandits," Friedkin's "Rules of Engagement," "Liberty Heights," "Six Days Seven Nights," "Sphere" and the upcoming "Envy. "
William Friedkin helped establish Gresham's career over 20 years ago with the "Brinks Job. " Her many other credits include "Ghosts of Mississippi," "The American President," "Disclosure," "Last Action Hero," "A Few Good Men," "Kindergarten Cop," "Misery," "When Harry Met Sally," "Ghostbusters II," "The War of the Roses," "Outrageous Fortune," "Tin Men," "The Natural" and "Diner," among others.

BRIAN TYLER (Composer) is an award-winning film composer, classical conductor and songwriter. He got his start in music at a young age and toured extensively playing in concert halls around the world and was inspired by his Academy Award® grandfather (an art director) to enter the film industry.
Tyler was recently awarded Best New Film Composer of the Year in Cinemusic Magazine and he received a 2002 Emmy nomination for his score to Henry Bromell's "Last Call," starring Jeremy Irons and Sissy Spacek. He was also nominated for a 2002 World Soundtrack Award for his score for "Frailty," starring Matthew McConaughey in Bill Paxton's directorial debut.
Shortly after completing "Frailty," Tyler scored the upcoming "Children of Dunes," starring Susan Sarandon, the comedy "The Big Empty," starring Jon Favreau, Kelsey Grammer and Rachel Leigh Cook and "Darkness Falls. "
Other film scoring credits include the blockbuster hit "The Fast and the Furious," the independent "Panic," starring William H. Macy and Neve Campbell, the cult favorite "Six-String Samurai," "Plan B," starring Diane Keaton and Paul Sorvino and "The 4th Floor," starring William Hurt.

WILLIAM FRIEDKIN: A Conversation with F. X. Feeney

Shortly after seeing "The Hunted," film critic and screenwriter F. X. Feeney sat down with director William Friedkin at his office on the Paramount lot. Sitting in the book-lined cloister in a building that once housed the creative likes of Ernst Lubitsch, Preston Sturges and Billy Wilder, Friedkin discussed his intriguing film.

FXF: "The Hunted" feels true to themes you've explored throughout your career, themes about heroes who are divided against themselves. Much as we're technically rooting for L. T. (Tommy Lee Jones), one has to wonder why he didn't answer the desperate letters he received from Aaron (Benicio Del Toro) back when his former student could feel his own sanity about to slide over the edge.

FRIEDKIN: L. T. is totally guilt-ridden. He realizes that he has undertaken the training of assassins and he can't really live with that. That's why he got out of it to work with the Wildlife Fund. Actually, this character is based on our chief technical advisor, Tom Brown, Jr. , who is part Indian and a tracker. He was taught by his father, but was never in the military and never had to kill anyone himself. He's also trained Special Forces, Delta and SEALS to track, to survive and to kill, and he still does.

When I met Tom, I saw he had this tremendous guilt because he would show some young soldier how to make his way through some area in camouflage, become unseen, then kill somebody. Later, he'd find out the guy had been targeted for political purposes; that is, somebody in power decided that this person deserved to die. So that's where Tom's guilt kicked in. He didn't know who the enemy was anymore.

When I met Tom, I saw he had this tremendous guilt because he would show some young soldier how to make his way through some area in camouflage, become unseen, then kill somebody. Later, he'd find out the guy had been targeted for political purposes; that is, somebody in power decided that this person deserved to die. So that's where Tom's guilt kicked in. He didn't know who the enemy was anymore.

FRIEDKIN: I felt this was a fair way to go into the Tom Brown world. Then, when I cast Tommy Lee, it became the only way to go: understated. I wanted to make sure the information about their backstory was made available, and as visual as possible, but I didn't want to push it out there.
I was principally fascinated with the nature of a guy who has these skills -- he's able to survive and kill -- but he's never really used those skills in combat. He teaches them to a younger guy who does use them in combat, and who is driven mad by his knowledge. Ironically, when Aaron reaches out to L. T. for some kind of guidance, and doesn't get it, he winds up clashing with his mentor instead.

FXF: I saw "The Hunted" last fall when the D. C. Sniper was still at large, identity unknown. It was hard to listen to all the reports without thinking that the culprit might turn out to be like Benicio Del Toro's character in the film, especially since he seemed to have a covert-operative's skill for extracting himself from the crime scenes.

FRIEDKIN: I thought the same thing, and I was grateful to be proven wrong. But there are a lot of topical ideas at work in "The Hunted" that I hope are concealed behind the action line. Still, it's meant to be an action picture that will cause you to reflect on certain things, such as: Why do we keep training people to go out and kill other people? Yes, we need a defense. The world is dangerous. But why are we raising hundreds of thousands of young men to not value human life?

FXF: An even deeper nerve "The Hunted" hits upon is this notion that Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein are killers we've nurtured, and in Osama bin Laden's case, even trained. There was even Manuel Noriega before them. One could say that we actually raised these vipers.

FRIEDKIN: Exactly. And gave them billions of dollars. In Osama bin Laden's case, to drive out the Russians. All on the theory that "The enemy of my enemy is my friend. "

FXF: And then we desert these guys.

FRIEDKIN: They go off on their own way, and we don't like the way they've gone, so they're the enemy now. Yeah. We've created a lot of monsters that have turned against us. The U. S. is the greatest creator of Frankensteins ever, whether foreign, or homegrown like Timothy McVeigh.
That said, let me stress there is no "message" in this film. There are questions I hope people will wrestle with when they reflect on it, but I don't provide answers. I have none -- only more questions. I've never really made a film where the good and evil were entirely separate, because I truly believe there is good and evil in all of us. It's a constant struggle, on a daily basis, for one side or the other to prevail. I think that's true of all people from all nations. They could be religious people, and they'll still have this struggle of good and evil going on inside them. I've never really made a film -- from "The French Connection" to "The Boys in the Band" -- in which there were clear-cut bad guys and good guys. The characters that fascinate me are those that embody both. Actually, Benicio's character, Aaron, is probably the true good guy in "The Hunted. "

FXF: He's the one with the purer heart. He's the one saying to the hunters, "You don't respect the animal you're hunting. " And though that's not the movie's "message," it creates a nice irony. In fact, in that huge posse going after Aaron, L. T. is the only one who actually respects him. That is, of course, why L. T. is the only one Aaron ever lets come within speaking distance. L. T. fulfills the logic of the question Aaron is posing.

FRIEDKIN: Exactly. I always prefer the kind of film in which a lot is drawn from the audience's imagination. And from their intelligence. I never try to tell an audience what a picture is about. I really prefer that they think about it, and whatever it's about, that's what it's about to them, as individuals.

FXF: The fights in the film don't feel at all "choreographed," they feel chaotic and very real. How did you prepare for them with the actors?

FRIEDKIN: That "chaos" is a method called "wolverine" fighting where you just jump on each other's chests and start fighting. But we did prepare. Tommy Lee and Benicio rehearsed. I had them work all this stuff out with Tom Brown and two of his assistants for months in a dojo.
As actors, Benicio and Tommy Lee are both very different in nature, and therefore, they work very differently. Benicio needs all the preparation he can get, and time to find his character before each shot. Tommy Lee just instinctively goes out and does it. His first take won't be much different than if I did thirty takes with him, and I never do a lot of takes with him. He's just ready. He has the quality that I most value in an actor: intelligence.
I learned how to work with him on "Rules of Engagement. " We didn't mess around with a lot of rehearsals, and we didn't "freeze the performance," like it was going onstage. It wasn't going onstage. A film performance has to look live, and real. It has to look like it's happening right then and wasn't studied. Tommy is the best actor you can find to do that. He looks like he's just making it up as he goes along. But he works for hours alone, getting to the point where, when you say "action," it's there. He's there.
Benicio's great, too, but he's different. For example, I would talk for hours with him about the inner life of his character and the backstory. With Tommy, not one conversation about that.

FXF: Benicio Del Toro's physical movements in the Kosovo sequence are absolutely striking, and when he dives headfirst down that ventilator and snakes through it without a sound, it's amazing.

FRIEDKIN: All that's completely authentic, and again, I credit Tom Brown. As for the Kosovo sequence, it was important to set the first scene there. Under NATO auspices, the United States decimated that country, while the ethnic cleansing was going on. While the Serbs were shooting up all the Kosovars, Albanians and Muslims, the United States was bombing. It was a totally surreal madhouse. So that's why I set the first scene there, the better to dramatize how Benicio's character gets such an overdose of just indiscriminate killing that he's never able snap out of it.

FXF: There's a tense moment when the Serbian child comes into the room and you don't know what Benicio's character is going to do. His eyes are terribly expressive at that instant, but you're not sure what he's thinking. He might kill the girl, he might not. That he doesn't is huge a relief, and guarantees Aaron our sympathy even after he slips past the child and kills that Serbian.

FRIEDKIN: There are three little girls in the film: that one, the daughter of the woman Aaron loves in secret, who thinks of him as a surrogate father and the little girl that L. T. notices at the airport, playing hide-and-seek, whom he helps. In each instance, I was thinking of the way Fellini used the young girl at the end of "La Dolce Vita," waving at the hero from a far shore. He waved back but could never cross over to her. He could never again attain that innocence which would allow him to do that.
Mind you, I didn't calculate these things; they just got into the film. I don't know why I have three little girls in the picture. They don't figure into the plot that heavily. As for the little girl in the Kosovo scene, she came out of a line of extras and I thought she was beautiful. Her part in the film wasn't even scripted and she'd never acted, but I was inspired to use her to drive home the horror of what had been going on there.

FXF: This hearkens back to something you once told all the students at AFI back when you were fresh off "The Exorcist. " You said that there was a point early in the production where you felt you had a documentary about Iraq, you had shot so much footage.

FRIEDKIN: That's the most exciting part of filmmaking. You go to a location. You're not in a studio. You're not married to anything but the reality of the world that's going on, and you try to integrate this story, or this action, into the prosaic settings that are its surrounding.

We did that with "The French Connection. " The chase was totally developed into the areas that fascinated me visually. I mixed New York with Brooklyn and Queens, from one cut to another, and just integrated the action without extras. We'd get to a point where I'd say to Gene Hackman, "Why don't you come down the stairs and try to flag down a car, over there? And I'll have three cars go by, and then we'll see what a guy who's actually on the street driving -- who doesn't know we're filming -- we'll see what he does, if he'll stop. " We would attempt all this stuff on the spot, but it all was dictated by an environment that I had scouted.

FXF: I've wondered, especially with regard to "Rules of Engagement" in relation to "The Hunted," whether your sympathy for the military mind grows out of the nature of the film director's job. After all, in order to direct, you have to be a strategist and fighter yourself.

FRIEDKIN: You have to have a sense of how you're going to go out and accomplish what you're trying to do. You can't just go out and do it. And like a good warrior, you then make yourself basically invisible. You don't let people in the audience see your technique as a storyteller, if you can help it. And even when you're in production on location, you don't operate with a big public presence, using a big crew. The ideal as a filmmaker is, as much as possible, to embody the line that Tommy Lee uses about Benicio: "Half the people he killed didn't know he was in the same room with them. " Half the people we film don't know we're out there, filming them.

FXF: Even in the Portland sequences?

FRIEDKIN: Sure. We just hid the camera. We put it on a roof, or inside a moving vehicle, and used long lenses. We integrated the action right into people walking in the park or trying to get to work on the street. None of them are looking at "a film in production. " None of them were expecting to see Tommy Lee Jones go running by them.

We did the same kind of thing in a foot chase down Madison Avenue in "The French Connection. " I actually put the three actors into the middle of a noonday crowd.

FXF: There's a progression from "The French Connection" through "To Live and Die in L. A. " to "The Hunted" in that they all have chase sequences, but the emotional stake seems to have grown from one film to the next. I suppose that's because of the bond between L. T. and Aaron, but also because of the presence of Irene (Leslie Stefanson) and her little daughter in Aaron's life.

FRIEDKIN: You're right. Part of the emotion might also have grown out of the current political climate. People now live under the notion that they could get whacked just going into a pizzeria. But I've always lived like that. From the time I grew up, I have lived in a constant state of tension and anxiety. But I think we are all beset by irrational fears that very often are real fears. Fear of exposure, fear of failure, fear of success!

FXF: How do you cope when you're not making movies?

FRIEDKIN: I get relief through music or art -- mostly through the higher art forms like literature. I read Proust every day. This is the third translation that I'm reading right now. It's a new one that has come out in England but hasn't come out here. They haven't excised the poetry, but they've clarified a lot of things that were misunderstood because of the way he wrote, in the margins. I'm one of those guys who marks his life "Before Proust" and "After Proust. " Reading Proust has helped me to understand a lot of things about myself and human nature.

FXF: Have you ever been tempted to write a novel?

FRIEDKIN: No, because I'm so blocked by Proust's achievement. I can still make movies because there's nobody who really intimidates me. There are filmmakers whose work I like and admire very much, but I don't feel that there's a Proust out there, or a Garcia Marquez, to name another giant who's just made it impossible for me to write fiction.
I went to the Lycee Condorsette, which is the school that Proust went to. Still there, still operating. I went in and there was a registrar there, and I said: "Do you have any of Proust's papers from when he was a student?" She asked, "Are you American?" I said yes, and she just looked at me, asking, "Why are you interested in that?" I said, "I've read everything he wrote, some of it in French. " So she went into the back and brought back all these files, including Proust's report card, from when he graduated. You know, he was an asthmatic and he failed French! But his headmaster wrote over his final grade, "He worked as hard as his affliction would allow. " Yes, I'm deeply steeped in Proust, but you don't see that in any film I've made.

FXF: Not in any overt way, but I was thinking, while you were talking, that the power of memory is an affliction that drives a lot of your characters. Even when you don't dramatize that memory with a flashback, the past is very much a presence in your films. Popeye's conscience grows out of a loyalty to something even he can't articulate in "The French Connection. " There are the loyalties and might-have-beens that are eating at the cops and criminals in "To Live and Die in L. A. " And you have the slippery nature of memory when choices go wrong in "The Rules of Engagement. " That seems more true of your films than most American films I can think of offhand, especially action pictures.

FRIEDKIN: That was not planned!

FXF: Which filmmaker has most influenced you?

FRIEDKIN: In a very literal sense, I learned from Antonioni to never repeat a shot. To go from one set up to another, to another, without any repetition. I don't ever go over my shoulder to you, then over your shoulder to me, and back and forth. Even if I'm going to do two sets of over-the-shoulder shots in a row, I change the angle on each, and the perspective, and the height and the width. In that way, the story moves along laterally, like literature.

FXF: Now that you mention it, I don't recall a "repeat" shot even in any of your chase sequences.

FRIEDKIN: No. I'll go 80 shots in a row without a repeat. As in Antonioni, you'll see 80, 90 shots in a row, then he'll repeat something for some reason. But always for a reason. And even in the repetition, there is always an alteration to the way it was used before. For example, the person sitting there in the shot before will now get up and exit the room and the camera will follow him. There's always this movement, this continuity of something going somewhere. Antonioni's films externally appeared to be going nowhere. You know, long walks? People just strolling, looking, doing nothing. There'd be street life, little things happening but nothing story-wise, yet they all seemed to be moving and providing this anxiety because you were going somewhere and you didn't know where, or what was around the corner.

FXF: When you prepare action scenes, do you storyboard at all? Or do you still go on instinct?

FRIEDKIN: No. I'll look at a location and I'm inspired by the location. I'll often create scenes for that location. I'll sit with the writer -- in this case Monterastelli -- and say "Let's put something here!" The film takes on a life of its own once I'm in the cutting room. It literally tells you what it wants to be.
As a director in the editing process, which is the process I love the most, you have to be open and listen to the film. You're not trying to shape it so much, as pay attention to what it's telling you. This happened to me with "The French Connection. " The film I shot is not the film that came out of the cutting room. The film kept saying to me, "I am not this. I am that. This isn't working. " So the whole pace, and everything else, came out of the editing. I had a plan, but it didn't pass muster in the cutting room because I listened to the film the way a composer listens, or a writer hears the words. Much Stravinsky was asked, "How did you come upon The Rite of Spring? It's the most radical piece of music of the 20th century. It changed all music that came after it. How did you devise this?" And he said, "I was the vessel through which The Rite of Spring passed. " I totally understand that. And Flaubert once said, "Madame Bovary is me. " In the same way, I am all the characters in my films and the stuff they're putting out there is just coming through me. And when I'm in the editing room, I'm just wide open to the shape it wants to take.