Interview: Emily Mortimer, Bella Heathcote, Robyn Nevin & Director Natalie Erika James Talk RELIC
With or without a major theatrical release, Relic, from IFC Films, is surely one of the biggest horror releases of the year. Do you hear that out there? That’s buzzzzz. Taking part in a world-spanning virtual roundtable, three generations of actors – Bella Heathcote, Emily Mortimer, and Australian theatre legend Robyn Nevin – came together to talk about making a familial horror story that became very personal to each of them during filming. Director Natalie Erika James was also there with us taking questions about the true-life inspirations for Relic and how the encroaching evil in the film could be seen as dementia personified. Funny how the word dementia so closely resembles the word demon.
Synopsis: When elderly mother Edna (Robyn Nevin) inexplicably vanishes, her daughter Kay (Emily Mortimer) and granddaughter Sam (Bella Heathcote) rush to their family’s decaying country home, finding clues of her increasing dementia scattered around the house in her absence. After Edna returns just as mysteriously as she disappeared, Kay’s concern that her mother seems unwilling or unable to say where she’s been clashes with Sam’s unabashed enthusiasm to have her grandma back. As Edna’s behavior turns increasingly volatile, both begin to sense that an insidious presence in the house might be taking control of her. All three generations of women are brought together through trauma and a powerful sense of strength and loyalty to face the ultimate fear together.
Note: Dread Central was part of a virtual roundtable with other journalists in the horror community taking part.
Dread Central: What did you like best about working with each other?
Robyn Nevin: I think the ease with which everybody just moved into relationships with each other. Everybody was very open and I think quite at ease from the start and very much themselves. Though as individuals we were just relaxed about being who we were. And somehow, cleverly, Natalie assembled a group of women who just came together very well. I loved them all. It helps.
Natalie Erika James: I think just how game everyone was to get into such heavy subject matter and to trust me and trust each other. Also how game they were to do all the stunts because there was quite a bit of that in the film. It can feel really extreme and ridiculous at times when you’re rehearsing it but also incredibly fun. To commit to that level of intensity emotionally and physically is just a gift that these guys have given me.
Emily Mortimer: Well, I just feel so psyched about all of these three women that I now count as friends. They’re just properly funny, bright, and down to Earth and kind of normal. All of them.
Bella Heathcote: Just being able to laugh when things got really dark was a lovely escape.
Dread Central: I would love to hear from our actresses in terms of talking about coming into this project. What was that initial appeal that hooked you in? I’m curious if you could talk about the approach of your characters in terms of exploring the generational divide between these women and how grief and how the stresses of these thematic elements effect those differences.
Bella Heathcote: The script grabbed me. It’s rare that you read a horror script where you’re emotionally invested. I didn’t want to put it down. The end of the film just kind of gut punched me in the best possible way. I think as far as the generational divide goes, I find that often…it’s easy to be friendly with your grandparent than it is with your parent because they’re the ones that do the disciplining and set the boundaries. I loved how that was present in the script. I felt like I was really on Robyn’s side and I was willfully misunderstanding Mom’s intentions and it was just more fuel to the fire of whatever complexity was between us. I loved that the relationships were really difficult.
Emily Mortimer: I agree. I felt that it was just so recognizable and truthful – the feeling of going home. And going home to be with your parents or your parent and how that makes you feel both full of love and safe in a way, and yet also full of all sorts of confused and strange emotions. Natalie’s script was really good and…subtle and not banging it over the head. It was very kind of delicately done. Just the complications of being somebody’s daughter and somebody’s mother. However much you love the people that you’re related to, you can also feel a lot of pain and regret and confusion in their midst, too.
Robyn Nevin: I’m a mother and a grandmother. It’s certainly not my story but I recognize so many elements in the story. I just instinctively understood it. The generational divide is something I also understood because I’m living it. It also took me back to my own mother who died maybe 13 years ago, I think. I’m now feeling the guilt from that relationship from my side of it that I might have felt if I allowed it to be present when she was still alive. That all adds to the complexity of the work that you make.
Dread Central: There are so many personal stories that are coming out of talking about this film, so I just wanted to thank you all for just being so personal and very forthcoming with your own personal stories about your family. I wanted to talk about the ending in that regard. It’s very tender but it’s really audacious. It’s a daring ending as well, it’s not predictable. Natalie, were there other endings you considered and, for the actresses – Emily, Bella and Robyn – was that final scene filmed at the end of the shoot? Regardless, it must have been very cathartic for all of you.
Natalie Erika James: Yeah, certainly. Yes, the ending was originally different in its first form, probably in the first draft. Even the characters were slightly different. There was a husband character for Kay and a brother for Sam. It was actually quite substantially different. I will say that the sentiment was always the same and it always ended on a note of connection amidst this horrific examination of aging and dementia. I would say, in terms of what you see on the screen…that came probably mid-development. It wasn’t a last minute change. The sentiment of that has always been there from the start.
Bella Heathcote: When did we shoot that? I feel like we shot towards the end…
Natalie Erika James: It was Emily’s last day, wasn’t it?
Emily Mortimer: I think it was!
Natalie Erika James: We had a big “That’s a wrap!” on that bedroom set.
Bella Heathcote: Oh my god, what a way to go out. It’s funny that you talk about personal stories because I don’t know how else to talk about grief without referencing personal stories. That’s one of the things I loved about this film and one of the things I loved about that last scene. Just that idea of coming to terms with mortality…and the fear of hereditary diseases which is a fear that I’ve carried with my family. I get emotional just thinking about that scene. I also get emotional thinking about Emily’s last day!
Robyn Nevin: I just have to say that I actually wasn’t there, of course. I didn’t see that until I saw the movie at Sundance and it was very, very affecting. Very affecting. When the action within the scene of the [SPOILER] was just so extraordinary and I don’t know what kind of imagination that comes from Natalie. It was profoundly affecting and I didn’t even quite understand why. It was something I had to think about in retrospect. It was very beautiful. I did go through the prosthetics to provide the skeleton, let it be reported!
Emily Mortimer: That scene from the moment I read it, to being in it, and then to watching it, it was the same feeling. This is something I couldn’t even imagine in a million years, this notion. It’s so wild, it’s so out there and outrageous and strange and crazy and horrifying. And yet, it feels so familiar. That was what was so extraordinary about it. It felt so right.
Relic is available everywhere July 10 in Select Theaters, Drive-Ins & Digital/VOD
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