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I've written films that are violent. I'm not big on sitting and watching violence.

Violence is inevitable in crime novels, but there are many different ways to tell a story. I use my characters' reactions to illustrate the worst moments rather than let readers witness them at first hand.

I think it's very easy to disgust the reader with violence on the page - that's incredibly easy - but it's far harder to make a reader care about a character.

It fills me with dismay sometimes when you look at the scripts that do come to you that are primarily focused on violence. There are so many other things to play around with.

I am profoundly fascinated by cruelty, fear, horror and death. My films show my preoccupation with violence, the pathology of violence.

I've always been fascinated by accounts of seemingly 'normal' people who have committed horrendous acts of cruelty and violence. You hear it on the news all the time.

I was a very violent kid. I think movies and writing and art have been a way of channeling this.

Some of my films are known for the depiction of violence. I don't have anything to prove with that any more.

My work is less violent because we tend to write what we want to read... and I'm not that interested in gruesome books. Any violence, to fit in well with a crime novel, has to have compassion.

You have to show violence the way it is. If you don't show it realistically, then that's immoral and harmful. If you don't upset people, then that's obscenity.