Steven Zaillian Quotes

#1. The main thing that I learned from editing is that most people, when they're making a film, they start too early into the story. They will try to set up the characters, they will try to establish things before the plot actually starts.

Steven Zaillian

#2. You do a draft and you get more notes. You start to get the feeling that this either isn't going to happen or it is going to take a really long time to happen, and I never felt that with this [the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo].

Steven Zaillian

#3. I have no problem with anyone being precise about small things.

Steven Zaillian

#4. People who would go to an arthouse cinema and watch a Swedish movie and read subtitles ... it's a small percentage.

Steven Zaillian

#5. I find that most of my scripts have a lot more scenes than most films, so the average movie might have 100 scenes, my average script has 300 scenes.

Steven Zaillian

#6. I'm not one of those people who writes long soliloquies.

Steven Zaillian

#7. The similarity between the big directors I've worked with is that they allow the writer to find a way of doing what they want done without saying 'do it this way.' They describe what they want, then letting the writer figure out a way to do it.

Steven Zaillian