A biography for Alex Garlandhasn’t been written yet.
“I've written original material before, where I've come up with the idea and the characters myself, and that's definitely very different to working with someone else's characters and stories.”
“My approach to directing is to not do very much directing. I'm mainly interested in what the creative group individually and together are thinking.”
“I think that screenwriting probably isn't seen as writing in the same way that novel-writing is seen as writing. But I certainly don't see it that way.”
“It slightly depends on your perspective, sort of how you look at these things, but when I sit down to write a script, I'm not planning to write a script; I'm planning to make a film, and so I only see the script as being just a step there.”
“I think everything I write is from an atheist perspective. I mean, it's partly from an atheist perspective because I'm an atheist, and I'm just not really interested in religious-based questions.”
“If someone says Wes Anderson is an auteur, I'll believe it 100 percent. Fine. He's an auteur, but I'm not.”
“'The Beach' novel, in my mind, was, in some respects, subversive.”
“Maybe to have a memory you need time for reflection, however brief, just to let the memory find a place to settle.”
“I didn't like being a name attached to a book.”
“What I see in science is a lot of imagination referring to things that are fundamental to what we are. Our cells, our history, our future, our place in the universe, our lack of place in the universe. That's poetry as far as I'm concerned.”
“I don't write on set. I also - in a funny way, I don't really differentiate between the writing and directing. I think it's all sort of the same thing.”
“Sequels are generally done in a rush. They're done with a sense of urgency. The first time, you spend a long time developing to get it over the line. The second time, you don't. Your expectations are different, and your motivations are different.”
“I'm always pushing back against the last thing I did in some way, and some of that is restlessness and a sense of limited time.”
“When I'm really fixated on a bit of writing, I can easily spend six days without leaving the house and barely leaving my room.”
“I know some directors get very involved in trailers and posters. Some even cut their own. I stay completely away from it. I just see my job as making a film.”
“I don't like dealing with money transactions in poor countries. I get confused between the feeling that I shouldn't haggle with poverty and getting ripped off”
“It's perfectly reasonable to say that AIs are potentially dangerous. That seems to me like a statement of fact.”
“On that trip I learnt something very important. Escape through travel works. Almost from the moment I boarded my flight, life in England became meaningless. Seat-belt signs lit up, problems switched off. Broken armrests took precedence over broken hearts. By the time the plane was airborne I'd forgotten England even existed." (The Beach)”
“Tourists went on holidays while travellers did something else. They travelled.”
“The scripts of 'The Wire' are fantastic - the scripts of 'Breaking Bad,' the scripts of 'Mad Men,' the scripts of 'The Sopranos,' the scripts of 'Battlestar Galactica.' You could keep going on. They're incredibly well written.”