"Flawless" is careful to avoid recycling stereotypes.
Stereotypes often occur because people are so fearful of political correctness. It's often the case that the portrayal of anybody in drag has to be sweet and non-threatening. In reality if you are a man and you want to walk around in a dress and face violence, then you really have to be tough.
Was one of your main aims to ask the audience to re-evaluate their own preconceptions?
I don't think that films can ever make that much of a change but if people just see it for a moment and take some time to think about it, then that's great. We all judge people - including me, and I consider myself a bleeding-heart liberal - and then decide that they are not for us.
With "Flawless" the upcoming "Tigerland", and "Phone Booth" you seem to have really found your direction. A comforting place to be?
It's not, because I wake up in the middle of the night and think: what are you doing? But that's just fear because I really feel I'm becoming a better director and a better person by doing it. It was always my dream to be a director though I never wanted to protect my status as an A-list director in Hollywood. I never wanted to just keep it vanilla - the biggest selling ice-cream in the world. I'm so proud of some of my films, I'm proud of "Falling Down", I'm proud of "8mm" - which was the most out-there thing I've done - and I'm so proud of "Flawless".
