:: What can you tell us about HOME, the new Manchester arts venue of which you are patron?
"I've been away in America making a film for the last six months, so when I was last at home, the place was just a shell so there was a lot of suspension of disbelief, thinking, 'Oh, I hope that's going to be OK' – and it's more than OK. It's a wonderful, beautiful space to walk into, with five cinemas and two theatres and three art galleries. It's an amazing facility to have opening, because it's a pretty hostile environment at the moment for the expansion of the arts and culture generally."
:: How has the Steve Jobs biopic, starring Irish actor Michael Fassbender, been going?
"We finished shooting Steve Jobs and we're just editing at the moment. I have to go back [to the US] unfortunately tomorrow morning; it's a very quick editing period because the film is out in October. Once we got it going, it went very quickly. I can't really tell you anything about it and I don't want to publicise it now, because people can't see it [yet]."
:: Do you know your leading lady, Kate Winslet, has said she'd put a bet on Kerryman Fassbender winning big next awards season?
"She's a very smart woman Kate, and a wonderful actor as well, so I wouldn't bet against Kate Winslet."
:: It's 20 years since your directorial debut and cinema breakthrough Shallow Grave. How do you reflect on that movie now?
"One of the things you're always worried about when you're starting out, is that you don't know enough and you'll get found out and it won't work, and actually, when you look back on it, you realise those qualities are what made it good. It's a kind of innocence and naivety and it creates a wonderful atmosphere in which to go into a film, because you're discovering it and keeping it fresh."
:: You're 58 now – do you feel jaded these days?
"Well, it's more difficult to sustain [that freshness] when you get older and have more experience. You realise you're trying to recreate that feeling of naivety and it's weirdly contradictory to the fact you're becoming more experienced, and you know how to make film, or you think you do. No-one really knows, because there aren't any rules, or there would only ever be successful films. It's a precious innocence that you try and maintain in how you approach subject matters and characters, rather than a cynicism or knowingness."
:: Do you have a favourite film that you've directed?
"You have your own relationship with them, and then they're released and they have this distorting experience, where some of them are very popular and some of them are not very popular at all. And that's a distorting mirror on what was your relationship with them. As a rule, I don't pick ones out – it's not very wise to do so because you can't see through all these mirrors. I really don't know, is the honest truth."
:: So it's not a film like Slumdog Millionaire that won so many awards?
"If anything, if you really pushed me, you feel more protective of the ones that don't work in the public eye. The ones that really took off, like Slumdog and Trainspotting and 28 Days Later – which was a huge cult hit especially in America, which is just bizarre – sort of get taken away from you. They're not yours, and in fact you meet people who know more about them than you do. If anything, it's the ones that people don't cherish and haven't watched multiple times or gone to see that you feel a bit more protective over I suppose."
:: Is Porno, the sequel to 1996's Trainspotting, happening?
"I'd love to give you an update but I really don't have one on that. It's still a possibility, but we haven't made any particular progress that I can tell you about at the moment."
:: Is it the script, or logistics of getting everyone together?
"It's a mixture of everything, really."
:: As artistic director of the 2012 London Olympics opening ceremony you worked closely with the BBC. What are your thoughts on the corporation?
"I think a powerful independent broadcaster, however it's financed, is critical to our national identity in Britain actually, not just important. Certainly, when we were doing the Olympics, we met a lot of people from all around the world, and the reverence they had for the power of that broadcaster as a truth-teller...
"I'm sure the model for financing it is probably outdated, but whatever decisions are made by the people we elect, I think it's important, and I think the country will hold them answerable [to ensure] that they do not diminish how critical that institution is to national identity. I think it's really a huge part of our lives and it's a wonderful thing, despite all of its faults, so I wish it well."
:: Do you have any advice for the team behind the games' opening show in Rio next year?
"If you're going to take on something like that, you have to be positive and believe in what you want to do with it, and don't let any of the naysayers get to you. I wish them well with it. It's a wonderful opportunity to present Brazil to the world, an amazing country, and I'm sure it will take a huge leap forward with all the world's attention on it."
:: Any other future plans you can discuss?
"Gosh no, we're working on a number of projects but they're not really at the stage where you can talk about them because they're amorphous, you're not quite sure whether they're ever going to form something coherent."
:: For more information on HOME see homemcr.org. Steve Jobs, directed by Danny Boyle and starring Michael Fassbender, Kate Winslet and Seth Rogen, is scheduled for release later this year.
