‘Went up the Hill’ Heads for Toronto Premiere With Vicky Krieps and Dacre Montgomery in Overlapping Roles as a Ghost: ‘Nursery Rhymes Are Dark’ (EXCLUSIVE)

Writer-director Samuel Van Grinsven says that his new film “Went Up the Hill” was inspired by a single image of two people in a room, a coffin between them, both equally mourning the person inside, but knowing next to nothing about one another.

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His film, which debuts this week at the Toronto International Film Festival, sees a young man, Jack (Dacre Montgomery), travel to a remote part of New Zealand to attend the funeral of his estranged mother. There he meets her grieving widow, Jill (Vicky Krieps). But his mother’s spirit returns, inhabiting both of their bodies to speak to the other one and instigating a threatening three-way nocturnal dance.

The film is financed with principal production investment from the New Zealand Film Commission and Screen Australia with support from Screen CanterburyNZ, Create NSW, Spectrum Films, Stage 23, RM Sound, Head Gear Films, Fulcrum Media Finance and the New Zealand Government’s Screen Production Grant. Australian and New Zealand distribution is by Vendetta Films. Bankside Films is handling international sales, and co-repping North American sales rights with CAA Media Finance.

Van Grinsven, who previously directed the well-noted “Sequin in a Blue Room,” spoke to Variety ahead of the film’s Toronto premiere.

You have called “Went up the Hill” a ghost story, but not a horror film. Please explain?

It’s a tricky thing. There’s definitely horror elements throughout it. There’s some horror films that inspired it, in terms of our references, but I would hesitate to call it a fully a fully fledged horror. Structurally, it’s different to that, even in terms of pacing. Our inspirations are Bergman’s “Persona” or “Hour of the Wolf” or “Personal Shopper” by [Olivier] Assayas.

Three characters played by two actors, including one played by both, creates a degree of confusion for the viewer. How intentional is that confusion?

Confusion is natural in a premise like this. I think often the characters themselves are quite confused. [Audiences are] very much where the characters are at. It’s pretty rare that the characters are ahead of the audience. Vicki Krieps’ character Jill is [ahead] to begin with, and that’s probably the moment in terms of the identities and possession and the shifting identities, that is the most confusing. It’s the first time you step solely into her point of view and you meet Jack in Jack’s body. [Later] you meet Elizabeth in Jack’s body, and that’s where we put the audience [narratively] behind.

But we were not so much seeking confusion as aiming to let the audiences experience what these two characters are going through.

You make it clear that both lead characters are gay, but it doesn’t appear to be a major theme of the movie. How come?

I think if both characters were to be straight, that there would be an ingrained audience expectation of the two of them falling in love. And I wasn’t interested in that. I liked the idea that their connection, if you removed that element from their relationship, they would be forced to trust each other in a way that is like brother and sister — and then almost like mother and son.

You are dealing with weighty subjects. Why risk trivializing them by referring to a kids’ nursery rhyme in the title and through the character names?

The “Jack and Jill went up the hill” nursery rhyme is fascinating in the sense that it’s quite confusing. It’s two characters searching for something in a place where it’s not commonly found — going to the top of a hill to find water doesn’t necessarily seem the most logical thing to do.

Also, there’s the maternal connection of a nursery rhyme, which is passed from mother to child and from family to family. That felt extremely powerful, when you’re talking about generational trauma, or the way in which cycles of abuse are passed on.

And the repetition that comes with a nursery rhyme is close to the cycles of the darker themes that we’re dealing with. Finally, I liked the sense that nursery rhymes are used to lull a person to sleep [where my characters experience so much].

How did Vicky Krieps come on board?

She was actually the first person we thought of for the role of Jill. And she really believed in the project from the moment she read it. But it is a big ask coming all the way to New Zealand, and she wasn’t available to do the role.

Then COVID happened and everyone’s schedules changed too. We ended up shooting the film later than we expected, which opened that door again to having a conversation with Vicky. We shot in 2023.

She’s a very instinctual artist who follows her gut. She felt ready to explore and wanted to bring to this to the screen. So, she came on board in an executive production sense, and supported the film to getting off the ground.

Where was it filmed?

We ended up shooting the film in the Canterbury Highlands of South Island, New Zealand, about two hours from where I was born where my family come from.

And the ice scenes?

The content in which the characters are stationed on the backs of the lake was shot at a real Lake Pearson location, the one that you can see from that house.

Then, for the scenes in which they’re physically on the ice, we built surface in a large open paddock, just in front of the lake. We were able to work with some incredible art team in New Zealand who had experience with building those surfaces for films like “Avatar” and “The Hobbit.”

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