As a director, is that what makes every movie personal to you – or is it something unique to this one?
DAVID FINCHER: Look, what Mark does is no different than directing a movie – it's what I do for a living every day. You grow something, and your job is to grow it well and to make sure it gets enhanced and to take care of it. That's the subject of the movie. And if you have to hurt people's feelings in order to protect that thing, that's what you have to do. It's a responsibility.
You want to love every character in the movie. You want to be able to understand them. You want to be able to see what's there. You want to be able to see their humanity. You want to be able to relate to them. But, as a director, the characters' behaviors are inevitably related to facets of moments in your own life. You look at the work and say, Maybe I do know what that is.
I've been the angry young man. I've been Elvis Costello. I know what that's like. The anger is certainly something I felt that I could relate to — the notion of being twenty-one and having a fairly clear notion of what it is you want to do or what it is you want to say and having all these people go, Well, we'd love to, we'd love you to try. Show us what it is that you want to do. It's that whole condescending thing of having to ask adults for permission because the perception is that you're too young to do it for yourself. And that's why I understood Mark's frustration. You have a vision of what this thing should be. And everyone wants to tell you, Oh, well, you're young. You'll see soon enough.
And the movie, on some level, is a testament to Mark's work ethic — his relentless ability to execute that vision.
DAVID FINCHER: Right. Mark does what no one else in the movie does and he's the guy who reaps the rewards — but he also pays a price. He was the one saying, Advertising? I don't know — that's a way to go about it but I don't know if it's the only way. And I totally concur with that.
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