As a massive fan of scary movies, the idea of being able to live through one and still come out alive and well is pretty damn thrilling. And thanks to the fine folks from Sony Pictures Entertainment, a number of journalists were invited to do just that. In preparation for the release of the trailer for DON’T BREATHE, the latest film from Fede Alvarez, we were invited to Countdown Live Escape Games LA in Downtown Los Angeles. While there, small groups gathered to experience something very similar to what you see in the trailer for the film… and yes, it was insanely creepy.
DON’T BREATHE is about three young people (Daniel Zovatto, Jane Levy, Dylan Minnette) in dire need of money who make the terrible decision to rob an older blind man (Stephen Lang). Once there, they become painfully aware that he is not quite as fragile as they had expected. In fact, he is absolutely deadly. You can check out the trailer below and get a taste of what we experienced while living in our own little nightmare.
Joined by Mr. Alvarez himself, we were led into a locked room – yep, you are locked in – where we had to find clues, get the money and get the hell out. And let’s just say that when we realized we weren’t alone, it was actually a pretty intense experience. We found clues in brail which had to be deciphered, and of course there was the constant sense that the owner of the house would be ready to attack at any time. And quite frankly, I just kind of ran around trying to avoid any door that opened unexpectedly. All the while, spooky music played around us building tension That said, we did get out. But it wasn’t without a little well played help from the actors involved. It was quite the experience.
Before stepping into our own private thriller, we were given a glimpse of the new trailer and I’m happy to say it looks like another solid effort from Mr. Alvarez. Afterwards he talked a little about the production and how he felt about presenting a trailer for the first time.
To me, it’s always about showing as little as possible… And there is definitely a lot more than what we are showing right now.
He went on to discuss some of the cameras used and how they helped the process.
There is a camera that we use a lot in the movie which is called Blackmagic. Blackmagic Pocket, which I personally own… It was mostly used for getting the camera in impossible places. The movie is pretty claustrophobic so sometimes it just fits right there, and you want to have the camera right at his feet [gesturing to where I’m sitting] and while we’re shooting, we’d normally have to move the table and put a hole in the floor and get the guy down there, lunch, and then come back and shoot. With the Blackmagic, you just put the camera down there and it looks fantastic.
And when it came to utilizing night vision for one intense sequence.
I don’t know if you’ve read anything about the film but there is a scene where it’s full darkness and we had to figure out how we are going to do that. You need light to see what is going on. And it was interesting to see the drama that is happening there when there is no light at all. And basically we said, it’s never been done before, there is always a night vision camera in the scenes where you see stuff like that in movies. Like in THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS you have Buffalo Bill with the goggles. It’s never been done without a device in the story. But it worked [to have it without a device] and when people see the movie so far it is one of those set pieces they are going to remember. We took a chance to see if it worked and it worked really well.
In regards to the story, Fede was asked when will the audience realize that the blind character is more capable than he appears? And who the audience may root for?
The beauty of this story for me, at least when we started talking for the first time about it, was that you pitch it to someone and you say it’s about these kids that are going to break into a blind guy’s house and try and get away with his money. You are like, wait a second, because why would I follow these kids right? And part of the beauty with this story is that I don’t like to spoon feed you who you should like and who you should not. Movies tend to do that really easily. First they show you someone with X amount of problems and this is who you connect with, and then they show you someone bad. And I think that the movies I love are usually more ambiguous. It’s something lately that some TV shows have done very well, like Game of Thrones. It has people that you hate and suddenly you start to like them and then the evil is passed on to someone else. That is something that DON’T BREATHE does a lot.
And finally, he discussed working with the talented Jane Levy once again.
Basically Jane was the first person to read the script. We became really good friends during EVIL DEAD. So she knew I had a new script and she wanted to read it. She read it and she loved it. But she wasn’t available back then, she was making another movie. So I went out to cast it and we’d been looking for that girl for a long time, and when I was really close to start shooting a couple weeks before, we still didn’t have the lead actress. I think she had posted something on her Instagram and I was like, ‘wait a second, she’s home and she’s not shooting’ so I called her and she said the other movie didn’t happen. So I asked if she wanted to make this movie and she said, ‘f*ck yeah.’ I was happy because that was always the intention from the beginning.
We at JoBlo would like to give a huge thank you to the very talented Fede Alverez, the fine folks at Sony and of course Countdown Live Escape Games LA for the early Friday the 13th celebration!