"I didn’t think there was any more story, and I didn’t want to do it again. All of my ideas were for the first Halloween – there shouldn’t have been any more! I’m flattered by the fact that people want to remake them, but they remake everything these days, so it doesn’t make me that special. But Michael Myers was an absence of character. And yet all the sequels are trying to explain that. That’s silliness – it just misses the whole point of the first movie, to me. He’s part person, part supernatural force. The sequels rooted around in motivation. I thought that was a mistake. However, I couldn’t stop them from making sequels. So my agents said, ‘Why don’t you become an executive producer and you can share the revenue?’ But I had to write the second movie, and every night I sat there and wrote with a six pack of beer trying to get through this thing. And I didn’t do a very good job, but that was it. I couldn’t do any more."

"The mask that Michael Myers wore was written as “the pale features of a human face” – that’s what the script said. However, we had no money to manufacture such a thing, so what did you do? There were two options – one was a clown mask, which was a better mask, but the Captain Kirk mask was altered, spray painted, eye holes cut, with the hair. I don’t know if he knows the story."

"The opening shot was inspired by Touch of Evil. Orson Welles did a couple of one-take sequences, but the most astonishing is not the opening sequence which everybody remembers. In a motel room, in the middle of the movie, a man is broken by Orson Welles’ character. It’s almost a reel-long one-shot. It’s astonishing. I was inspired by the idea of that. So in the opening scene, we were coming up on the outside of the house, around and up the back steps, and as we passed through a room going into another room the crew would re-light it behind us. We were just flying on the edge, but that was the spectacle, the money shot. Plus we had a naked girl upstairs! You couldn’t ask for more than that. There are a couple of cuts in that first shot. The mask allowed us to do a cut, and there were botched takes — we didn’t make it up the stairs, there was a camera shadow, something would happen. But it was fun."

"I thought if I died today what would happen to me? A hateful girl... A selfish girl... An adulteress... A liar."

"You're a writer so you have yourself a goal, I guess. I used to, you know, lay in bed and imagine other cities, other jobs I could have; other husbands. Now I don't even know what to imagine anymore."

"How it all came down to this, only the Devil knows. Retail Rodeo is at the corner on my left. The motel is down the road to my right. I close my eyes and try to peer into the future. On my left, I saw days upon days of lipstick and ticking clocks, dirty looks and quiet whisperings. And burning secrets that just won't ever die away. And on my right, what could I picture? The blue sky, the desert earth, stretching out into the eerie infinity. A beautiful never-ending nothing."

"Aimee Garcia - Nurse"

"Deborah Rush - Gwen Jackson"

"Mike White - Corny"

"Zooey Deschanel - Cheryl"

"As a girl you see the world as a giant candy store filled with sweet candy and such. But one day you look around and you see a prison and you're on death row. You wanna run or scream or cry but something's locking you up. Are the other folks cows chewing cud until the hour comes when their heads roll? Or are they just keeping quiet like you, planning their escape."

"Tim Blake Nelson - Bubba"

"John Carroll Lynch - Jack Field"

"John C. Reilly - Phil Last"

"Jake Gyllenhaal - Thomas "Holden" Worther"

"Jennifer Aniston - Justine Last"

"Jack Field: Holden was a thief and a disturbed young man and what happened was a sad thing. Perhaps we can learn a lesson from this tragedy like don't steal and don't be disturbed."

"Corny: It's a church. You can't make water without bumping your nut on a bible."

"After living in the dark for so long, a glimpse of the light can make you giddy. Strange thoughts come into your head and you'd better think 'em. Has a special fate been calling you and you're not listening? Is there a secret message right in front of you and you're not reading it? Is this your last best chance? Are you going to take it? Or are you going to the grave with unlived lives in your veins?"

"[to Holden] I was looking at you in the store and I liked how you kept to yourself. I saw in your eyes that you hate the world. I hate it too."

"Attention, shoppers. There's a Retail Rodeo special on aisle 3. Liquid Drain Cleaner, 2 12-ounce cans for $5.00. Liquid Drain Cleaner has churning power and it will churn right through your pipes. Ladies, you need female plumbing. Shove something clean and new up your filthy pipes. That's Liquid Drain Cleaner on aisle 3. Have a good day and thank you for shopping at Retail Rodeo."

"[in a letter] Dear Justine, because of you I'll be quitting the Retail Rodeo. The last two days have been the most godawful of my life. I have not been able to get rid of you in my head. I'll never want anything so bad, and I've wanted many things. I'd given up long ago on being 'gotten' by someone else, and then you came along. The idea that I could be gotten because of circumstance, or never get got, is the worst feeling I've ever felt, and I have felt many bad feelings. I'm sorry I can never see you again Justine, forgive me for being so weak, but that's who I am. Goodbye, Holden. If for some reason, you could change your mind and wanna be with me, body and soul, meet me after work. I will be waiting for you at 5pm outside Chuckie Cheese. If you are not there at five, you will never see me again in your lifetime."

"Wesley Jonathan - Bengel"

"Clyde Kusatsu - Judge"

"Ron Canada - Elden"

"Troy Winbush - Dave"

"Michael Peña - Guillermo"

"Kerry Washington - Ayesha"

"Matt Malloy - Charlie"

"Michael Welch - Ryan Pollard"

"Ann Magnuson - Karen Pollard"

"Martin Donovan - Harry Pollard"

"Michelle Williams - Julie Pollard"

"Sherilyn Fenn - Angela Calderon"

"Kevin Spacey - Albert T. Fitzgerald"

"Lena Olin - Marybeth Fitzgerald"