00:00I have to say, I know everyone always says this, but I was completely hooked by the script. I
00:06loved the... there was a simplicity to it, there was an elegance. In your question,
00:11you talked about temptation and you talked about... there is something about temptation,
00:18there's something about this story that is... it's tale as old as time, right? It goes back
00:23to the Garden of Eden, this Faustian bargain. What do we do? How do we perform? Do we crumble
00:30under temptation? I think for me, the way that this script presented that question
00:36in such an elevated and contemporary manner, within this dark thriller, there is that central
00:43question. What would you do? What would you give to make all your dreams come true? But what would
00:48be the result of that? And it just hooked me to be able to explore themes like that in such a
00:55thrilling way, in such a straight line, almost like a dark fairy tale. It really hooked me in
01:00that way. I think it was very different. I think it didn't... it's a really good question. I think
01:08for me, what I wanted to do was, I wanted to tell this story in a way that was sort of very truthful
01:15to the mystery. And Laurie, the writer, had written such a beautiful script, and I was so
01:20lucky to have this incredible triptych of actors in Giordano and Scott Lawrence that could tell
01:27this really intense, quite gothic parable, almost, this sort of cautionary tale, this warning,
01:37that I wanted to be very true to that. And I think in terms of the way that we...
01:42the way that the camera language, the sort of the cinematic grammar that we employed,
01:46like the choices we made in terms of production design, it was all very much in service of that.
01:52It's a modern fairy tale. It's a what-if story. It's the, as I said, that Faustian bargain. How
01:58do we take this sort of timeless story and make it feel current and modern and exciting and
02:05mysterious for an audience? That was very... I would say that was the approach I took for sure.
02:11It's a great script. It's lean and mean, and it's emotionally rich. Look, it's a thriller.
02:20It has to hit its genre beats, but there's a depth of character and a subtlety to it that
02:27I think attracted all of us. It's why we chose to do it. When you have actors as brilliant as
02:32Jordana and Scott, who give so much and who had this amazing chemistry together, whether it was
02:41a loving chemistry or a confrontational chemistry or a suspicious chemistry,
02:46they were so good together. They worked so well together and they bounced off each other.
02:51And I think for me as a filmmaker, that's the secret sauce. That's the magic ingredient. When
02:55you have actors who are able to do that, I'm very blessed in terms of... I have this wonderful DP,
03:01Michael Merriman, and the way he composes shots, the way he frames, he creates that air of mystery,
03:07of intrigue, of suspicion, of sex, of allure, whatever it is. But it's up to those actors to
03:13elevate it, to fill the frame, to draw the audience in. And Jordana and Scott were just
03:20phenomenal at it. They were such a pleasure to work with. The thing for me that I really enjoyed
03:26is this idea that we all have our cellar. There is somewhere in all of us where we lock it
03:32away. The lies, the secrets, the deceits. There's a part in all of us that
03:40we don't want anyone to look. And the idea that the cellar door, within the cellar door,
03:47the cellar door, could represent that to an audience. As a watcher, as an audience member,
03:53I love it when you walk out the cinema and you're having that conversation in front of
03:58the popcorn stand and everyone's bouncing off each other. They get that feeling of,
04:02would you open it? Wouldn't you open it? What was in there? Was anything in there?
04:07Was it Sarah's cellar door? Was it John's cellar door? I love those questions being posed. And I
04:11think that really drove me as a filmmaker. There is so much entrenched symbolism in the cellar door.
04:19But I think the most interesting thing for me is this idea of, again, this is a spoiler,
04:28but not revealing. What is in that cellar is in all of us. It's our deepest, darkest fears,
04:34our deepest, darkest shames, our deepest, darkest secrets. And this couple, this loving, tight,
04:43very nurturing couple in Sarah and John, it effectively destroys their marriage. It drives
04:51John almost crazy and turns Sarah into someone else. And I think that's a really fascinating
04:57thing to explore. Yes, I would 100% open the door. I would pretend I wouldn't. I'd pretend I'd be
05:02strong. And two days after I signed the contract, I'd be down there with a jackhammer, hair
05:08everywhere. Yeah, no, I couldn't do it. I think I could, but I couldn't. The biggest challenge,
05:15I think really being true to it, believing in the brilliance of the script. I was so lucky to
05:23have Lawrence and Giordano and Scott, who did as well. And it was creating a mystery for the
05:30audience, trusting the audience to go on the journey, to be on the roller coaster with us.
05:35And we really wanted to do that. We wanted to make a heightened, dark thriller that had this
05:41sort of central, almost like fairytale quality at its heart. And that was the big challenge.
05:46That's what we wanted to do.
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