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Your new movie Diabolic
- in a few words, what's it about?
A young woman trapped inside an FLDS community starts to believe that
a supernatural force is trying to free her from it. The film is really
about whether liberation can come from something dark, and whether the
institutions we replace our old beliefs with are actually any better.
What were your sources of inspiration when writing
Diabolic, and in what way
does your movie reflect your personal take on the Mormon church?
I've always been fascinated by religion, and particularly the sects
within religions that decide the mainstream version isn't extreme enough
and essentially embrace the worst parts of whatever doctrine they follow.
I love religious horror but I do think it's become a bit tired because of
how heavily it leans on Catholicism. I wanted to do something different. I had the image
of a witch, and I had a tone and a feeling, but I didn't yet have a
way into the story emotionally. When I met Mike Harding and Ticia
Madsen, who has real personal experience inside the Mormon church,
everything clicked. The FLDS world is genuinely fascinating and
honestly we've barely scratched the surface of it with this film. don't think
Diabolic is anti-Mormon specifically. It's more broadly
about how institutions, religious or otherwise, can fail the people
inside them, particularly women. That felt like something worth
exploring. You wrote the story for
Diabolic together with Ticia Madsen and Mike Harding - so what can you
tell us about them, and what was the writing process like?
Ticia brought authenticity to the world in a way that I couldn't have
achieved on my own. Her personal experience inside the Mormon church gave
the script a specificity and an emotional truth that immediately made the
whole thing feel grounded rather than exploitative. She also really
understood the spiritual and psychological reality of the characters in a
way that kept us honest throughout the process.
Mike is a really smart structural writer. He was very good at asking the
difficult questions about character motivation and escalation,
constantly pushing us to make sure the story was working at a
mechanical level. He kept the tension honest. What worked well was
that we all cared about slightly different things. I was pushing
hardest into atmosphere, cinematic language and the psychological
horror elements. Mike was focused on narrative momentum. Ticia was
grounding the emotional and spiritual reality. The three perspectives
complemented each other well.
Do talk about your movie's approach to horror! And a few words about your overall directorial approach to your story
at hand? The approach was always to earn the horror through character first. I
think the reason films like
The Exorcist still
hold up is because you believe in and care about the people before
anything frightening happens. If an audience is emotionally invested in a
character, the supernatural elements become so much more effective. We were very
deliberate with camera movement, sound design and pacing. I wanted a
sense of psychological pressure that builds gradually rather than
relying on jump scares or shock tactics. The film leans into certain
genre tropes early on quite deliberately, because part of the
intention was to subvert expectations later. I also made some
fairly bold stylistic choices on this film that were genuinely risky.
They could have not worked at all. I'm very pleased that audiences
have responded to them.
What can you tell us about your movie's main location, and what
was it like filming there? And was the script written with that location
already in mind?
The location needed to feel isolating and oppressive without being
overtly theatrical about it. We needed an environment that could credibly
contain this world and make the idea of people being cut off from the
outside feel believable. When you find the right location it really does
inform everything, including performances, because actors respond to their
physical environment enormously. The script wasn't written with a specific
location locked in, but the tone of the world was always very clear.
We knew what it needed to feel like. Finding somewhere that matched
that feeling was one of the more important early creative decisions.
Do talk about the shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere!
Independent filmmaking is basically constant problem solving. Every single
day something is trying to destroy your schedule. We were working with a
relatively limited budget and fighting for every shot, so the team had to
be incredibly resourceful and committed. I think that shared pressure
actually creates a good on-set atmosphere when everyone genuinely cares
about the film. And on this one, they really did.
Anything you can tell us about audience and critical reception of
Diabolic? The reception has been
really gratifying. Most of it has been very positive and it's been
interesting to see which critical observations line up with my own
feelings about the work. I've also seen some really in-depth analyses
of the film's themes and symbolism, which means a lot because myself
and the team put a huge amount of care into that subtext.
Any future projects you'd like to share?
I've got a few things in development. One is a contained underwater
survival thriller called Beneath, which combines
adventure, psychological pressure and horror around a deep-sea salvage
mission. Another is a true crime series set in South Australia exploring
institutional failure and moral panic. Both feel tonally very different to each other and to
Diabolic, but
they're both very character-driven, which I think is probably just where I
naturally end up. I'd also love to stay in the
Diabolic world if there's an appetite for it.
What got you into filmmaking in the first place, and did you
receive any formal training on the subject?
It started the way it starts for a lot of people. Making films on
weekends with friends, saving up to afford a blood pack or building
something from scratch to achieve an effect. There was just something
about the process of putting images together and making people feel
something that I found completely addictive from very early on. I did pursue
formal training, but honestly I think you learn the most from actually
making things. The theory is useful but nothing replaces being on set
under pressure and having to make real decisions.
What can you tell us about your filmwork prior to
Diabolic?
My debut feature was Awoken, which introduced a lot of
the same interests that carry through into
Diabolic. It was a
grounded genre film that took character and emotional reality seriously. I
learned an enormous amount making it, including that I had played certain
things a bit too safe creatively. That experience really informed the
decision to take bigger swings on
Diabolic.
How would you describe yourself as a director?
Character-driven, I think, above everything else. High-concept ideas are
only interesting to me if there's an emotional or psychological truth
underneath them. I'm also probably quite instinct-driven on set. I think
too much deliberation can kill the energy of a scene, so I try to trust my
gut and create an environment where actors feel safe enough to do their
best work. Filmmakers who inspire you?
James Wan is a big one from a genre perspective.
The Conjuring is
just an incredibly well-directed film. There's nothing particularly novel
about the story itself but the confidence and clarity of the filmmaking
makes it stand out as one of the best horror films I've ever seen. Denis
Villeneuve and David Fincher inspire me enormously too, because of how
controlled and intentional everything feels. Even when things are
visually stylised the emotional logic is always completely clear.
Your favourite movies?
The Conjuring
and The Exorcist
are probably my horror touchstones. I also really love films that
take genre seriously as a vehicle for emotional truth rather than just
spectacle. The Exorcism of Emily Rose I think is underrated. I enjoyed
The First Omen more recently quite a lot.
... and of course, films you really deplore?
Films I deplore are probably the ones where the spectacle has completely
swallowed the character. When you have extraordinary visual effects in
service of a story where you don't care about anyone, it just feels empty.
Budget and scale are no substitute for emotional investment.
Your/your movie's website, social media, whatever else?
People can find me on Instagram or reach out through my management at
Zero Gravity. Anything else you're dying to mention and I have merely forgotten
to ask? I'd love to talk about Larue, because I think some people have watched
the film without fully understanding what she represents. She's not just a
supernatural antagonist. She's the embodiment of every woman the church
has wronged across centuries, and the film is really about her revenge on
that institution. There's also a lot of intentional symbolism in the animal imagery that
I think some audiences have partially picked up on but not completely.
Each animal on the pikes represents something specific in Mormon
mythology. The rabbit is adultery and unclean sexual motivation. The
fox is deception and trickery. The snake is about embracing a healthy
sexuality and also transformation, because a snake sheds its skin to
become something new, which is exactly what Elise's journey is about.
The snake imagery is throughout the film to express this idea - that
Elise needs to shed her skin and change to overcome (or become) her
demons. The hair imagery is connected to this too. It's about the
rejection of masculine ideals imposed on women within these
institutions. We were very deliberate about all of it and it means a
lot when people engage with those layers seriously.
Thanks for the interview!
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