The newest iteration of Resident Evil to hit the big screen is looking to get back to the game franchise’s terrifying roots, and the production was so effect it even freaked the cast out from time to time. Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City is abandoning the sci-fi angle of the previous movies in order to follow the original story of the games, which means a set filled with empty buildings, dark hallways, and quite a few in-your-face scares.
There’s a particular scary moment in the film that involves a woman breaking through glass and charging at Claire, the character played by Kaya Scodelario. While speaking to ComicBook.com, Scodelario said shooting that scene at night made for a frightful experience, but seeing the actress who played the woman later helped keep everything in perspective.
“The whole film kind of felt like that, because we shot the whole thing at night. So, for three months we didn’t see daylight. It was during the pandemic. It was in freezing cold Canada. So, we were all a bit on edge, and a little bit anxious to begin with,” Scodelario explained. “And I do have quite a vivid imagination. So, on that day, I do remember being very, very freaked out, until I went to go to the porta-potty, to go to the toilet, and I saw her queuing up, and then I was kind of like, ‘Okay, you’re just a person. Everything is all right.'”
For quite a few folks, the Resident Evil games were an introduction to the horror genre. For Scodelario, however, it was The Exorcist that first showed her how scary movies and games can be, and she still isn’t ready to give it a rewatch.
“I watched [The Exorcist] when I was way too young. It was my eighth birthday sleepover, and it came on the TV, and we all watched it,” she told us. “And my mum got in so much trouble from the other parents. She got called in to the school, because like four of them are traumatized, and yeah, it really messed me up. It was a bad, bad sleepover. So, The Exorcist. I still can’t watch it to this day. I’m like, ‘No, thank you!'”
Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City is now playing in theaters. You can watch the full interview with Kaya Scodelario in the video at the top of the page.