24 hours with John Woo
I like every part of the film-making process, but I especially like to be on set. It's always an exciting time. We tend to start at 7am, which means I have to get up at 5am because it's normally a long trip there. I can't drive - I've never learned and it's far too late for me now - so my assistant drives me and I go over the schedule for the day in the car.
I've been in America since 1992 and I've used mostly the same crew since I got here. It saves a lot of time explaining everything. They already know how I like to set the cameras, they know my style. Knowing people so well also gives the set a family atmosphere. I think of the crew as my family. I always eat lunch with them, just like everyone else, lining up for the food. They could do some special food for me but I don't want it, I want to eat like the others. The only thing I need is a bowl of steamed rice - I like my own tradition.
When I'm shooting I always ask the crew to a big dinner. I ask each group in turn because we're so large - with the action crew, we could be 50 people; the same for the camera crew. So wherever I shoot I need to find the best Chinese restaurant in town. It's always good in Vancouver, where we just shot Paycheck. I like to hear what problems the crew are facing, what are the troubles on the set - with the producer, the studio, whatever - and through this we have become good friends. I hear their family problems too. It's a very healthy thing to do, unlike what we did in Hong Kong. There, people like to drink like crazy, enjoy the nightlife - it's too much of a social thing. Here we do it in a respectful way: we appreciate each other's work and we go out for a nice dinner and that's it. Mostly, we work 12-hour days so I really can't go out late any more. It's too tiring.
In LA, if it's not a shooting day, I go to the office at about 9.30 or 10am and we work until about 8pm. I live in Pacific Palisades because it is close to our new offices in Santa Monica. I have a production company with my old partner, Terence Chang, called Lion Rock Productions, and we work on movies, TV shows and we have a computer games division too. We're very busy. I have three assistants. My younger daughter, Angeles - she's called that because she was born here - works as one of my office assistants. She's 23. As a parent, I worry about her future and how she will get a good job in this business. It's so tough, but she likes movies as an art and has made some short films. It's not as though she thinks it will make her fame and money, otherwise I would tell her not to do it. My older daughter Kimberley works in my office too. And my son Frank is still in college, studying medicine. He just wants to help people.
I really like the lifestyle here compared to what I had before in Hong Kong. Of course I love Hong Kong, but in the film business you have to deal with so many people - I was getting lost in it all. In our business there are many people who care about loss of face. If you're invited somewhere for a drink and you don't go they will lose face, and I had to care about that kind of thing. I think people are too close to each other in Hong Kong, there's not enough privacy, especially in the film business. It was too crazy for me as I got older. All I want now is a quiet life.
That's one of the reasons why I moved to Los Angeles. But the other is that it was good for my children. I am a hard-working man, but in Hong Kong we push ourselves too hard. We work like crazy, seven days a week, more than 16 hours a day. It was hard to find time for my children. I never had a chance to talk to them. Sometimes I brought my work and my temper home with me, and it made them begin to hate me. When they were very young there was a time when they really needed someone to care about them and their father to talk to them, but I never had the chance. I really regret that. And that's why I decided to move them over here.