I enjoyed the "Film is Dead" featurette, where you gave a more convincing argument than George Lucas did, point by point, about why you really think digital filmmaking is the future?

I'm really excited. In fact, I just got the new cameras that came out, and we're going to shoot this weekend already. I'm starting to get into doing projects that just aren't even possible on a film. That's what's so great about the new technology. It allows you to dream about things that weren't even possible before.

In this next one, once people see it, they'll know there's no way to have even shot it had it not been for the new technology. And that's great. When you can conceive of movies that are not possible with the current, you know, older technology, then that's when the technology is really revolutionary because that allows you to tell new stories in different ways, and it really opens up the art form.

Will you ever work in film again?

Can't go back, not at all. It's like giving up -- that's like saying OK, enough of this computer stuff, I'm going back to my typewriter. Yes, you can't go back. It just doesn't make any sense. They can do everything the film can do but plus so much more.

You talked in your commentary about how the success of the "Desperado" DVD helped create interest in making the sequel. Do you see the DVDs as becoming a more powerful influence?

Well yes, I think especially when people didn't get a chance to see a movie in a theater for whatever reason, whether it was the marketing or the timing of the movie or they weren't sure if that was the movie they wanted to see. I know "Desperado" was, ahead of its time. People hadn't seen that kind of action movie before, the trailers, and it just didn't seem like it was what it was. And they discovered it later, you know, through other media.

That's what's really valuable to a filmmaker, so I put a lot of importance on a DVD. Because if people didn't see it in a theater, which a lot of people don't get to see it in a theater, if they want to see a movie at any other time, any other year, that's how they're going to see it.

So I try to make the packaging and the materials that go with it really definitive, sort of, your final statement on your movie because that's how people are going to enjoy it. So I've always tried to put a lot of importance on the DVD release, sometimes even more than a theatrical release because that's really where the life of the movie will be.

There was an awful lot of really good commentary, and the features I thought were splendid. "10-Minute Cooking School" was fun. I thought if someone stays all the way to the end, they'll get a laugh.

I was doing 10-minute film schools on all the other DVDs. And so for those people who had seen them, you know, the past four or five I'd done, I thought it would fun to just send them up a little bit with a cooking school and then also the last commentary one.

What is your feeling about the multiple repackaging of DVDs lately? We're seeing a lot of multiple versions of titles, including Desperado and Spy Kids...

I remember "Desperado" came out, it was one of the first DVDs that Sony had put out. And I think it just had a "10-Minute Film School" and the commentary that was on there. I think they started to repackage after several years. So when the new movie was going to come out, they repackaged it so that people would see something knew who may have not had it already and weren't really enticed to buying the fully-loaded version, or were maybe thinking the quality wasn't as good. Because a lot of the earlier DVDs weren't done at a higher bit rate. And so sometimes there's improvements. And I like when they do things like put out a Superbit or if you don't really care for the movie you don't have to go buy all those versions.

But I buy everything because sometimes they don't get the filmmakers involved the first time, or because they didn't even know the thing was getting released. I think they've gotten away from doing what they used to do when they first started, which was right away putting out a bare bones one with nothing on it and then later putting out a full one so that you were, in fact, having to buy two.

I was successful in convincing them not to do that on my movies where when I've put something out that would be definitive. That's why the "Spy Kids 1" DVD didn't come out with anything because they put it out while I was shooting "Once Upon a Time in Mexico." And I beat them up pretty good over that. Then "Spy Kids 2" came out jam packed and "Spy Kids 3" will come jam packed, and there'll be a special edition "Spy Kids" that'll come out that'll have everything on it and that'll be it.

So you have found that the studios are more open now to letting you be involved and help make the decisions?

Oh, yes. I think they're much more savvy into that now knowing that that's what people want. They don't want to see multiple lame versions. They want to see something good right out the gate.

What is the magic number with "10 Minutes"?

In the first book I wrote called "A Rebel Without a Crew, Making Mariachi," I put a little chapter at the end called "10-Minute Film School." I had read a comment where Woody Allen had said anything you need to learn about making movies you can learn in a weekend -- and I said he was being generous. You could learn it in 10 minutes. I said here you go and I went through it really quickly.
It was just a way to get the readers to think simply, that they didn't have to have all this knowledge before they went out and tried making a movie, just to get them realizing a few basics and really learn by doing.

That was the idea. And so, when I came to making these little video versions, it made even more sense to put them in 10 minutes because a lot of times, there's only about 10 good minutes in them anyway. They're just spread out with fluff. And, you know, there never really should be more than 10 minutes I find. Once I've cut them down and taken out the spaces and the pauses, they're always under 10 minutes.

Are there any other filmmakers that you've been watching in the last couple of years that you think are as progressive as you?

Wow. I don't really know actually. I don't know of anyone who's kept up that much. I don't get to meet a lot of them because I live in Texas, so I'm out of the loop. But a lot of them have no idea what I'm even talking about.

But a lot of it is also because I jump from job to job. Because I do so many jobs - the music, the sound, picture, every area, all making leaps and bounds in technology. So that's how I was able to keep up with them. But that's why the room suddenly grew. My room suddenly turned into something that looked like it was about to explode there's so many things plugged into.

On past DVDs by other directors, has that material influenced you, and do you hope that the bonus material you create will influence the future filmmakers?

When I was first collecting laserdiscs, Criterion would put out most special editions. And I remember watching the "Taxi Driver" one and really beginning to hear what Scorsese was thinking while he was putting the movie together during the commentary. I thought well this is a great record to have. You know, if someone never even listens to it, it's fine, but it's there.

And it's connected to the movie. It's not in a book somewhere. So from then on, when I got into movies, I wanted to have all that extra stuff just so people would know what you were thinking. And you yourself, years from now, are going to look back and go what was I thinking when I made that wacky movie, you know?

when I wrote a book called "A Rebel Without a Crew and the Making of Mariachi," so many film students still bring me that book today to sign, saying they read it and they went out and made a movie. And so that always keeps me going too. Because I know there's a lot of people they know that my DVDs will probably have supplementary material that's really pertinent to them in breaking into the industry. So I try to jam pack that stuff in there.

How do you navigate the boundary between what the film aficionados would enjoy and the average viewer?

I make the "10-Minute Film Schools" for both. I figure if someone's going to go listen to a commentary, they're really interested in methodology in one of my movies. It's not really actor commentaries or the other kind of commentaries on there.

Are any DVDs that you've seen that have commentaries or other features on them that you've found instructive?

I always like the Ridley Scott ones. He's very informative. His commentaries are really dead on, and he's very studied and speaks very articulately about his films. Gosh, there's several -- there's several that I jump around on.

How did you come to choose Charlie de Lauzirika to do the supplementary material for Once Upon a Time in Mexico?

Sony called and said we needed to hire someone on the outside rather than Sony themselves. They have an internal person who does it, but I do my own things. And I liked his stuff, and what they do over at Scott Free. I liked their layout and how they did things. It seemed very thorough.

And I figured they'd put some extra special things together while I did my own. I usually do some of my own anyway and add it to whomever else is putting some things together. So I did "10-Minute Film School" and the "Inside Troublemaker Studios" and the "10-Minute Cooking School" and the commentary. I took care of those bits, and then they did the other ones. And they did a great job.

Did you find the collaborative process to be something that you'd be like to try again?

That's a hard one to answer. Usually there is someone that you're working with putting things together because you have to do them quickly. But yes, absolutely. When you have people that are imaginative and so into it, that's great because they come up with great ideas. And usually I try to top them with, well, "10-Minute Cooking School."

Have you seen anything recently on video or DVD that you were particularly taken by surprise, that you just loved, whether it's old or new?

"Zoot Suit," they finally released. It's a Luis Valdez movie. That's an amazing movie. It's very much a stage play, in the style of "Chicago," only this was years before. This was an '81 I think. And Edward James was almost unbelievable in that movie. That's like the best role he ever played. It's just a really great movie, great music and very, very stylized, and you can tell he just didn't have any money. And they shot it on the stage.
They shot it in a theater, you know. That was a real lesson even back then when I saw it in high school. You can make a movie even there in the theater room if you have to. So there's no excuse. You can be very creative just with some paper sets. It was really a great movie.

Do you think lower-cost CGI and digital equipment will change the face of independent, low-budget filmmaking?

I think it just opens up the possibilities, where they don't have to think of their movies as just having to be two people sitting across the dinner table anymore. It can be anything they want it to be, and it opens up much more possibilities for surprising people.

Because theaters today aren't really equipped to project in digital, is that going to have an effect on your shooting in the format?

Not really, because the number of theaters will be growing. And it really makes sense. Just how you capture the images changes how you work and what you can do with the actors on the set. Creatively it's just a huge boost. So even if no one ever gets to see what it looks like digitally, which a lot of people do when they get the high definition satellite and DVDs, I would still shoot with it.

I think you can make a better movie with it, actually. You can really see what you're doing while you're shooting it. And that changes things. I remember I was doing all my sound mixes in 5.1 even back before most people had the capability. It was only in very few theaters. But I did my "Desperados" and "From Dusk till Dawn" in 5.1. So when DVD finally came around to including it, I already had those soundtracks ready.

So I always try to use the very latest in technology even if it's not readily available to the public because someday they will catch up and then it'll be there.

As many converts to the digital cause as there are, there are also these people, say Roger Ebert, for example, who are very, very vociferous and angry almost. And there are filmmakers too who will say I will never abandon film. Do you think they misunderstand the technology?

Absolutely. I mean film is a technology, too. People seem to think film is more organic, and it's like that doesn't grow on trees. You forget, it's such an old technology that that too is a technology, and we tend to forget that. It was just the best technology we could come up with at the time. And it's really just outdated at this point. But people who have a real love for nostalgia just don't want to hear that sort of thing. But I did get some great reviews from Roger Ebert on "Once Upon a Time in Mexico." He wrote actually the movie looks really great. So I was like, Yes, I finally broke him! That was cool.

When George Lucas showed me some early footage from "Star Wars," I was like, Hey, I didn't know it was that far along. I hadn't heard a thing about it. I was actually angry that people had been hiding all that great information. So I went out and shot a test, and I went, Oh my God, people obviously don't even know what they're talking about it. That's been the case mostly.

I saw that 10 years ago with editing. They didn't want anything to do with an Avid or a computer. So this was not real. You weren't touching the film. But the technology isn't the art form. Touching the film on a flat bed isn't editing. Editing is manipulating images. Whether you use a computer or not it's the same art form. So that's what I think Ebert needs to shift to, is to what is the art form truly? Story telling by moving images, but that's not tied to celluloid.

On "Spy Kids 3-D", why did you choose to shoot 3-D in red and blue as opposed to doing the full color polarized method?

Once you shoot in 3-D, you're shooting it with two cameras. You can put it out in any version. In fact, we have a polarized version that's really, really amazing. It comes out way off screen. But there's only a handful of theaters that can show polarized. You need two projectors like an IMAX or a special silver screen or an over/under system, which is a special projector that can play two images coming off the same negative at the same time.

So it was just wasn't viable to go into a bunch of theaters with that process even though it looks really great because you get full color saturation. There's some things that actually work better. For instance, you can turn your head from side to side and not lose the 3-D. Where if you're watching a polarized one, as soon as you start leaning your head to the side, the 3-D goes away. You have to sit perfectly with your head still, but it looks really great.

So the only way to get in that many theaters was to go with red and blue. And that was cool. And I did some tests on the computer, and when you see the DVD, it looks really great on a home computer screen or on a TV. You really can see the 3-D working, and I thought, you know, that will be fun. That's how I remember 3-D being anyway. So I think kids and parents would have a kick out of putting on the red and blue glasses and getting a nice big headache from it.

Are you going to shoot anything else in 3-D?

Yes, I'd love to. We're working on another family film, a different kind of family film, for 3-D.

Because you're so used to doing your own films on your own terms, do you ever see yourself directing a project you didn't originate yourself?

Oh yes. I mean I like switching back and forth. It's, kind of, different when you - when it's something that you've written. You find that you know the material so well, it makes a little more sense to do more of the jobs. When it's someone else's script, well then it's much more open to interpretation and -- or adapting a book or something.

In fact, part of the next couple of projects are going to be things I didn't particularly write at all. And so, I like to jump back and forth and try different things and learn a lot from other writers and other filmmakers.
And in this case, it was really experimental. I was trying out new technology, the digital cameras. And I wanted to learn as much as possible, so that's why I did several sequels in a row because you can experiment more that way because with sequels, there's already a built in audience.

So the studio feels very safe, and no matter what wacky thing you do, people will still show up just because it's a sequel. So it gave me lot of freedom to try composing, to try the digital technology, to try 3-D, you know, just kind of, go out and learn as much as I could.

We've all heard about how heavily Johnny Depp was involved in creating his character for "Pirates of the Caribbean." Did you give him the same level of free rein in Once Upon a Time in Mexico?

In the commentary I pointed out places where he brought his own ideas and then things that seemed like they might have been his ideas but were actually in the script but he just does in such a fresh way it seems like he's making it up on the spot. That's part of what's great about what he does.
But yes, absolutely, when you hire someone like Johnny, you're hoping they'll bring, you know, everything he -- all is imagination to the table.

He's just always been that way. So it was one of my favorite written parts -- someone came in and just did it off the page. I mean he had three arms, he killed the cook, he lost his eyes. He was already a really interesting character. But I thought God, I can't wait to see how Johnny takes this to the next level. And he did. He was great. He just come is and it's just very free. I mean I gave him that kind of freedom as a director because I wanted to be an audience as a director watching him.

How many projects are you working on in various stages at any given moment?

When I first started out, I was always like a one-project-at-a-time guy. But I was going, "This sucks." Everyone else had development going on, you know, so I should really get involved with other writers and have them all working on material. I like self-generating things.

But over the years, suddenly I had a whole bunch of projects in various stages. So yes, I was just recently looking over them. I think there's like 12. I want to make each one of these, so how do I do that? So I'm trying to jam them all together.