For Jennifer Lynch, it might seem like she was destined to make movies. That could be attributed to having a father like David Lynch, who’s a visionary in his own right. Yet Jennifer still holds the record for youngest female director with her 1993 debut Boxing Helena. She’s also no slouch when it comes to directing horror pictures, as she became the first woman to win the Best Director award at the New York City Horror Film Festival for 2008’s Surveillance.

With Chained, Lynch gets inside the mind of a psycho, and begs to ask how serial killers are groomed. We were fortunate enough to get a chance to discuss the film and other topics with Ms. Lynch recently.

We were curious if the Bob character (played by Vincent D’Onfrino) was inspired by any famous serial killers, particularly the Zodiac.

I didn’t pull from any serial killers at all actually. The original script had Bob driving a taxi, and I love the idea that something we see everyday that’s bright, shiny, and yellow is unsafe. I just sort of ran with that.

This film is more grizzly as opposed to the light tone of a lot of horror films. Why is that?

There’s nothing wrong with a light-hearted gorefest, and I intend to do that with my next film. But this more about violence as a bad thing, and I thought it should feel that way. I was working toward letting the violence feel violent and terrible. I do think we sexualize and make a joke of violence, and there’s a time and a place for it, and I didn’t think this was one of them.

Female directors seem to be more prominent than they were ten to fifteen years ago. Could you comment on that?

I guess there are more women directors being recognized. I don’t know if there’s more than have ever been, but I think what’s funny to me is that I never see a film because a man or woman directed it. I never walk up to a man and say ‘you’re a great male director.’ The gender never comes into play, and I’m glad the people who are telling the stories they want to get to tell them. Someone said to me the other day ‘How can you tell these dark stories?’ I said ‘For crying out loud did you ever go to high school? Women are terrible!’ Violence has never been gender specific for me. I think man and woman are in all of us if we’re doing it right. I think women have much to say on any given topic as much as men do.

Chained is out now on DVD, Blu-ray, and video on demand.