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Portraying Pocahontas' story well was important to me because she was a real person and these were real events in her life.

Here in L.A., you kind of get stuck in your own little dilemmas and your own little life, and hearing a story like Pocahontas' reminds you there's a bigger world out there, and there are so many more important things in life.

I just want to learn even more about my culture and about the Algonquin culture because I fell in love with Pocahontas and the Algonquin tribe.

There aren't very many notable Native American female figures historically. That's the way that it's been. Pocahontas and Sacajawea.

If Pocahontas had been given the foresight to see what devastating consequences her actions and belief in the possibility of peace would have brought upon her people, I wonder if she would have avoided befriending the English or not.

Speaking as a mixed-race woman, there aren't many historical stories about people like me.

Moviewise, I would love to make the story of princess Erendira. She was a 16 year old princess/warrior who led her tribe in war against the Spanish around 1513. She almost defeated them, and the Tarascans were the only tribe the Aztecs couldn't defeat.

The entirety of 'Bellocq's Ophelia' was a project, and I was interested in doing research and looking at photographs and writing about them, imagining this woman Ophelia and what her life was like and the kinds of things she thought about.

I'm just trying to tell a good story and make thought-provoking, entertaining films. I just try and draw upon the great culture we have as a people, from music, novels, the streets.

A dear friend of my early childhood has worked as an anthropologist in Papua New Guinea for much of her life, and from the tiny island where her main work has been focused, she has brought me many funny and beautiful stories over the years.