A zombie Christmas musical coming-of-age tale that treats all its facets well – after a storming reception at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, Anna and the Apocalypse is in cinemas now. Stars Ella Hunt and Malcom Cumming chatted with Paul Simpson about the film, which was dreamed up by Scottish film director Ryan McHardy, who died from cancer midway through its creation.

 

At what stage did you both get involved with the Apocalypse?

Ella Hunt:     When I got involved they didn’t have [director] John McPhail attached. It was quite early in the process.

I read the script and fell in love with Anna – what a complex, three-dimensional woman she is. It was quite a surprise when I came up to record the songs before shooting and they told me of the genesis of the film, and Ryan and his impact on all of them. I was so moved. I think it was a lovely guiding light throughout the process. The special thing about Ryan’s memory to me is he encouraged a whole group of young creatives to go into careers in filmmaking.

Director John McPhail

Malcolm Cumming:           For me it was the opposite end of it. It was very close to shooting that I came on to it – November [2016]. I realised that I recognised some of the names on the script from being about Glasgow. I know who Tommy Reilly was, one of the composers, and I recognised Ryan’s name when I saw it on the script.

I was talking to my dad one day and put two and two together. It was Ryan McHenry, the one who did those Vines. I remembered sharing them with friends, and remembering after that he had sadly passed away. It was really nice coming together during those rehearsal weeks. [Producers] Naysun [Alae-Carew] and Nick [Crum] talked about that side of the film and the process for them.

We got some beautiful moments on set too – I remember when we shot the snow angels scene…

Ella:    That was a scene that Ryan and [co-writer] Alan [McDonald] had written very early on in the process. That was a very sentimental scene for a lot of the people that were making the movie.

Malcolm:       It was a scene that we both loved as well.

Ella:    It’s my favourite scene in the film. Even now, I look back with such joy at the love on that day.

There’s a little snippet of that scene in the trailer and out of context, it looks like the set up for an attack, but you then realise it’s one of the still points that these sorts of movies need to resonate.

Ella:    When we were first talking about making a film this ambitious, with this many different factors, Naysun and John were really clear that they wanted to root this story in really honest character emotions. Scenes like the snow angel scene and the one where we’re in the trolley were most important for setting the right tone for the film and making the audience believe and love these characters.

If there’s no investment in the characters, you might as well make a film with two sets of CGI characters trying to kill each other!

Malcolm:       I think with this film, with so many faces that it has – the musical element, the horror side to it – it’s very easy to get lost in those tropes, if you see it as this genre-specific thing, but [we keep] bringing it back to these characters all the time, bringing it back to Anna, to this coming of age story about a young woman who’s trying to find her way in the world regardless of what’s going on around her. That stuff is going to have an effect, but it’s always driven by that overriding objective. Everyone is on this path of self-discovery and I think that’s what makes it an enduring film.

Did you find that the songs gave you new insights into your characters?

Ella:    Oh man, it’s so fantastic having Roddy [Hart] and Tommy’s music to further explore our characters’ emotions. It’s the best way of voicing internal dialogue that you can possibly have. That’s what I’ve always loved about music, and coming at it from a songwriter’s perspective – I’ve been writing music since I was very young – it’s something that I find so important in music, being able to share things that you couldn’t necessarily share in everyday conversation. It gives you an insight into a character’s world beyond what you can say out loud without sounding cheesy.

Malcolm:       It does away with the need to communicate things subtextually – it’s an opportunity for performers to be truly honest as a character and put it out there.

As an audience member watching everyone performing those songs, the human voice is so emotionally charged. We were sitting there watching some of the shots that they were getting before we went to do a song, and it was like, “I’m totally in the headspace for this. I don’t need to do any more thinking about it.” They were just laying it all out there. You don’t need to question it.

Ella:    I think we were very lucky with Roddy and Tommy; our incredible musicians wrote a beautiful score. The lyrics are beautiful. We were given all the right pieces of the puzzle to take and make it into a fully rounded thing.

There were many different challenges of this film but which are you most proud of yourselves for surmounting, and can take forward into your next projects?

Ella:    I have a good one. I really didn’t believe in myself as a fighter. I’m not a badass. I’m really clumsy. At the beginning of the shoot when we were doing our little EPKs, all the cast were asked who would die first in a zombie apocalypse. Everyone said “Ella”… but when I came off that shoot I really believe in myself physically in a way that I didn’t previously and that’s because I had amazing people around me, and more specifically, an amazing group of women.

I had a female fight coordinator, female choreographer, female Director of Photography, female head of post production. That’s amazing, and it’s so inspiring, and I really think it can empower women. I came off that shoot feeling really more physically confident than I could possibly have expected.

Malcolm:       The biggest thing for me was to come onto that set and see the way in which all of these poeple could go in together and be so open and collaborative without any ego.

Ella:    No ego was present in the making of this movie.

Malcolm:       That is a rare thing. You need a certain hardness and toughness if you want to make something because you need to be assertive as an actor, make sure you do what you want to do. But we were able to go in there and not need to overthink anything, just give ourselves up to the process, and be part of it. I came off that job knowing that I can do that, and that’s a valid thing –people are responding so positively to a film that was made because people just wanted to make it from the ground up. It was long days, tough days, we didn’t have a lot of time, and some days we would be really up against it and have 20 minutes to get a scene, but from the ground up, producers down, everyone was so passionate that we got the best out of every moment and opportunity.

Ella:    It was filmmaking in its truest form, being a completely collaborative process.

Anna and the Apocalypse is out now. Thanks to Ben Twigger for his help in arranging this interview

NB The trailer below is the “extreme” version