I went whale-watching, and I was really looking forward to that, but when you see it on TV and you see other programs do it, you're seeing close-ups of these massive creatures, and the music that's added gives you a certain feeling. But in reality, you're stuck on a boat that's bobbing up and down, you feel sick, the whale isn't there on demand.
Light doesn't penetrate beneath the surface of the water, so ocean creatures like whales and dolphins and even 800 species of fish communicate by sound. And a North Atlantic right whale can transmit across hundreds of miles.
I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail; only last week, I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalised a brick; I'm so mean I make medicine sick.
To have a huge, friendly whale willingly approach your boat and look you straight in the eye is without doubt one of the most extraordinary experiences on the planet.
People sometimes feel frustrated about what's going on in our oceans and environment, and 'Whale Wars' shows that ordinary people can take action and make things happen.
I wanted to make connections between Whale's past and present.
Does Greenpeace think it can stop whaling in Antarctica by publicly eating whale meat and declaring it delicious? What are these people thinking?
Fiction was invented the day Jonas arrived home and told his wife that he was three days late because he had been swallowed by a whale.
We made connections between the monsters created by war and the monsters he created, the typical outcast that Whale was attracted to, and the monster in himself, that's inside all of us.
Thanks to a lot of people, not just myself, 'Whale Rider' had an amazing impact emotionally, and people remember it. I count myself very lucky that all those doors were unlocked, I just had to open them.