The thing about romance and romantic movies is that they can be somewhat melodramatic. For a lot of actors there's a certain cringe factor that's involved with that.

I get some of my ideas from watching my three daughters but most of them come from my own memories of growing up. I can remember how romantic I was not just about love but romance in the classic sense - the romantic ideals: of honor and truth of loyalty sacrifice and fairness. Those were the elements that made a story satisfying to me.

It seems to me that romantic comedies used to be about falling in love but in recent years they've really become just comedies where the love story is only there as a spine to hang the jokes on.

There's a hardening of the culture. Reality TV has lowered the standards of entertainment. You're left wondering about the legitimacy of relationships. It's probably harder to entertain the same people with a more classic form of writing and romantic comedies are a classic genre.

I had to trick people into giving me money for my first film. Making a romantic comedy is easier and more expected from a woman than it is to make a drama about a Japanese warrior.

But other vampire stories? Well no I really haven't read too many and I can't say I'm crazy about romantic vampires anyway - to me the vampire is simply an evil monster.

I got a degree in sociology didn't read much fiction in college and I was a pretty political left-wing type of guy. I wanted to do some kind of work in social change and make things better for the poor man and I was very romantic and passionate about it.

There are so many different reasons as to why I love riding trains. But I think ultimately it's the romantic feeling of it. There's something about it that just transports me into old films.

If I were sufficiently romantic I suppose I'd have killed myself long ago just to make people talk about me. I haven't even got the conviction to make a successful drunkard.

You won't find me in a romantic comedy. Those movies don't speak to me. People don't come to talk to me about those scripts because they probably think I'm this dark twisted miserable person.