If you thought Catholicism was scary before – you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Starring Bonnie Aarons, ‘The Nun’ opens in 1950’s Romania with the arrival of Father Burke (Demian Bichir) and new Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) fresh from the Vatican, sent to investigate the apparent suicide at a rural convent. What lay waiting for them had the audience at the edge of their seat and face to face with who went on to become the primary adversary of Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) in ‘The Conjuring 2’.
Obviously, possession, creepy Romanian convents, and a good dose of Catholic guilt is a deadly combination, so fans were eager to hear the behind the scenes scoop from director Corin Hardy, actresses Taissa Farmiga and Ingrid Bisu, writer Gary Dauberman, and writer/producer James Wan. And they did not disappoint.
Originally from Romania, Bisu expressed her delight at being able to return home, but also of getting to expose her castmates and crew to the “real Romania”.
“It was awesome to be known hopefully for something different than ‘Dracula.’ We’re ready for something fresh,” Bisu joked, and then added some things about the country were a huge surprise to the rest of the film crew.
“They were shocked by the amount of sour cream that we eat. We eat it with fried sardines and cabbage – my mouth is watering just thinking about it!”
But not everything was fun and games, Hardy described one day when they were filming in a particular medieval fortress and had to set up a particularly technical shot. Hardy settled down in front of a monitor in a room with who he thought were two members of the crew behind him and the only door in front of him. After the successful take, Hardy excitedly turned to the men behind him to share in the joy, only to discover there was no one there – the room had been completely empty the entire time.
Farmiga wanted no part of the “real life terror”.
“I get in bed in my hotel all alone and the demon nun is knocking on the brain, and I start meditating and I breathe and I count, and I don’t let her come in,” explained Farmiga completely serious.
If that wasn’t enough to put everyone on edge after the last clip was shown the theatre lights came up to reveal that we were entirely surrounded by demonic nuns ourselves whispering the Our Father in Latin – oh boy did that take me back (and not in a good way).
And extra exciting bomb was dropped at the end of the night by Wan who announced that a third “Annabelle” film was officially in the works and would be written and directed by Gary Dauberman. It’s set to premiere next summer (hopefully in time for ScareDiego 2019) and was described by Wan as “‘Night at the Museum’ but with Annabelle!” Have fun sleeping tonight with that image in your head!
Have the “hell scared out of you” with ‘The Nun’ in theatres September 7th!