The Big Picture

Collider’s Perri Nemiroff sits down with the team behind
Azrael
at SXSW 2024.
Samara Weaving, Simon Barrett and E.L. Katz discuss making a wild and gnarly horror movie with almost no dialogue.

Azrael
is about a young woman trying to escape a devout cult of mute zealots before they can sacrifice her to pacify an ancient evil that lurks within the surrounding wilderness.

The first time I saw Samara Weaving on screen, she instantly made a major impression by fearlessly going to an 11 in Season 1 of Ash vs. Evil Dead. After that came Mayhem in which she and Steven Yeun fight their way through an office building royal rumble. She shines in The Babysitter as the leader of a devil-worshipping cult, she kicks all the you-know-what in the 2019 gem Ready or Not, and she plays the top-contender in a live-streamed death match in Guns Akimbo. Weaving’s filmography is loaded with variety, but when it comes to extreme action, she’s proven she can handle anything, and handle it exceptionally well. However, even with all that experience, Weaving admitted that her latest genre film demanded she level up.

Weaving headlines Azrael as the title character, a woman who’s captured by a cult of mute zealots eager to sacrifice her in an effort to appease the ancient evil that lurks in the woods. Unfortunately for them, not only will Azrael stop at nothing to survive, but her pursuit of freedom turns into a mission of revenge, and she’s more than willing to unleash maximum bloody mayhem in order to decimate their encampment.

While in Austin celebrating Azrael’s world premiere at SXSW, Weaving, writer Simon Barrett and director E.L. Katz visited the Collider interview studio to discuss making the hugely ambitious action-heavy horror film.

Image via Mossbank

Clearly Weaving has loads of experience working in this space, but the role of Azrael comes with a laundry list of extreme performance challenges. There’s the intense action set pieces, the on-location filming, the fact that there’s no dialogue, and then some. Here’s what Weaving said when asked what aspect of playing Azrael she thought would be the toughest when she first signed on:

“I thought the biggest challenge was the obvious one, that no one speaks. So it’s all physical, and how to capture a scene without any dialogue. But that ended up being so wonderful and such a great challenge because, actually, we say so much without saying anything, and that’s usually the most important things, you know, said without words.”

Another element of the production that was mighty intimidating for Weaving? The weather.

“The weather was the thing I thought was gonna be awful, but wardrobe was good to me. I remember I wore so many layers. I wore like eight layers. My little head would pop out of layers of thermals. On weekends when we’d go hang out, people would be like, ‘Have you shrunken?’ And I’m like, ‘Yeah, no, that’s just miles of moleskin padding to keep me warm.”

Actors Passed on ‘Azrael’ Due to the Intensity of the Material
Image via SXSW

Related ‘Azrael’ Review: Samara Weaving Rules in Blood-Soaked, Mostly Silent Horror | SXSW 2024 E.L. Katz’s ‘Azrael’ takes a bare-bones approach to horror, led by a performance that cements Samara Weaving as a horror icon.

Given the sky-high intensity of the material and these production challenges, is Azrael Weaving’s toughest movie shoot yet? “I think yeah, it was.” She continued, “Emotionally I just prepared heaps. We would talk and we’d be like, ‘This is gonna be bad. It’s gonna be intense and it’s gonna be gnarly, but we have to just make it fun and not take it too seriously and just be silly.’”

Katz took a moment to jump in and emphasize that building a fun on-set environment for such a film was only possible because of how Weaving approached the work.

“A lot of that came from you because you had a good attitude about that, because I feel like everybody else would probably take it incredibly and crazily serious.
When we were meeting with different actors, I remember talking to one actress who, literally, after the call told her reps, ‘I can’t do this movie because it’ll be a challenge to my mental health.’
Because I would say, ‘This is gonna be truly grueling and miserable.’ And Sam on the Zoom was like, ‘Yeah.’”

What gave Weaving the confidence she could power through such a production? She viewed the opportunity as an extended version of an experience she already had — making Ready or Not. Here’s how Weaving put it:

“I think with
Ready or Not
there was a little bit of that because it was in the cold, me running around with blood all over me, so I thought, ‘Okay, it’ll be an extended version of that.’”

Image via Fox Searchlight Pictures

There’s a number of filmmaking feats on display in Azrael, but there’s no doubt the concept would fail to soar as high as it does without such fearless and committed artists in the lead role. Azrael is yet another title on Weaving’s filmography that proves she’s one of the strongest forces in action and horror out there.

Looking for even more on the making of Azrael? Be sure to catch my full chat with Weaving, Katz, and Barrett in the video interview at the top of this article.

Azrael (2024) In a world no one speaks a devout female hunts down a young woman who has escaped her imprisonment. Recaptured by its ruthless leaders, Azrael is due to be sacrificed to pacify an ancient evil deep within the surrounding wildernessRelease Date March 11, 2024 Director E.L. Katz Runtime 85 Minutes