While “A Quiet Place” is quickly becoming one of the scariest movies to hit theaters this year, John Krasinksi, who co-wrote, directed and stars in the film, never saw it as part of the horror genre.
“When I got the script it was definitely scary and all those things, but the thing I bonded to most in the original draft was this idea of family,” the actor told Variety in a recent sit-down. “For me, we had just had our second daughter three weeks before I read the script so I was wide open emotionally, I was an open nerve. So this idea of, when I did my re-write I thought I could really make this a metaphor for parenthood, I could really make this a metaphor that I believe in and I see immediately, this idea of protecting your kids, what would you do for them and how far would you go to protect to them.”
Krasinski admitted he wasn’t a big scary movie buff before this project, and got an education from watching “Get Out,” “The Witch,” “The Babadook,” and “Let the Right One In.” For his film, though, he “wanted it to feel a little bit more like a throwback, so it was all the Hitchcock movies and ‘Jaws’ and ‘Alien’ and ‘Rosemary’s Baby,’ it was sort of that feeling of the thrillers of 30 years ago, 40 years ago.”
The former “Office” actor entered new territory in co-starring with his wife Emily Blunt, admitting that prior to shooting they were both nervous, “because we each have our own individual process, so it’s not that we thought we were going to yell at each other on set, it was more ‘Oh my God, what if he gives me an idea that’s terrible’ or ‘What if she gives a performance that isn’t how I saw it?’”
The two put in weeks of prep going over the script and ideas before getting to set so that it would be smooth sailing when it got to actually making “A Quiet Place,” which follows a family who must live in silence as they hide from monsters who hunt anything that makes a sound.
“By the time we got to the shoot, there was nobody better to have on set than her, she watched me direct the scenes she was in and the scenes she wasn’t in,” he said. “She was just so a part of this process that it’s the best collaboration I’ll ever have.”
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