{"id":217526,"date":"2026-01-03T01:21:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T01:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/217526\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T01:21:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T01:21:07","slug":"daisy-ridley-zombie-movie-brings-new-twists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/217526\/","title":{"rendered":"Daisy Ridley Zombie Movie Brings New Twists"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tNo sound effect makes people squirm quite like grinding teeth. Zak Hilditch<\/a>, who wrote and directed the new zombie feature \u201cWe Bury the Dead<\/a>,\u201d out today via Vertical, has seen the noise make audiences shudder in real time, as it\u2019s the signature of the undead in his film.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen I was delving into the zombie world, we didn\u2019t have all the money in the world, so how do I make these things unique?\u201d Hilditch\u00a0says. \u201cThis idea of growing agitation, what does that look and sound like? It sounds like teeth grinding to me. So that was something even I was milking as much as I possibly could, wherever I could, as it was going to be a really interesting thing to have echo throughout the film. That particular sound was something that the sound team, before we even shot the movie, was most excited about delving into because they could see the possibilities there. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s been interesting watching the film internationally this year, on the festival junket,\u201d he continues. \u201cWhen we hit that sound, it\u2019s aching, like nails on a chalkboard. There were versions where it was even more extreme, and we had to pull it back a little bit to make it palatable for an audience. That was just one example of how this isn\u2019t a big studio film at all, yet we did everything we could to put you in that headspace. The sound was so important in helping guide that through.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the film, Ava Newman (\u201cStar Wars\u201d alum Daisy Ridley<\/a>) heads to Australia to find and recover her husband after a military accident. Unfortunately, the dead are rising after the incident, and Ava must avoid the teeth-grinding zombies.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cDead\u201d is the Australia-based auteur\u2019s eighth feature, and Hilditch was inspired to write it by the passing of his mother.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt was a personal initial kernel of an idea,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen it comes to grief, realizing there is no silver bullet or a special guidebook to get you through. When my mum passed, it was my job to pack down the family house that I grew up in, which she died in. It was weirdly cathartic having something physical to do. As a filmmaker, there was a part of me thinking, \u2018I\u2019m going room to room and making these discoveries.\u2019 There\u2019s something quite intimate yet surreal about it. I thought that there was something worth mining in terms of grief.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHilditch says that Ridley signing on for the project added an essential layer of humanity to the film.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt was just unbelievable,\u201d he says. \u201cShe was the very first actress we sent the script to, and within one week, we were Zooming. She was absolutely perfect for the role: Right time, right place. When she arrived on set, seeing that side of her and how she was all-in on this character and my words that I had spewed out on the page \u2026 You see her taking that and turning it into a living, breathing entity that goes far beyond your wildest expectations of what this was going to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHilditch says \u201cthe whole movie rests on Ridley\u2019s shoulders, and she absolutely crushed it.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI can\u2019t wait for people to see her in this light. I don\u2019t think she\u2019s done something quite like this before,\u201d he adds. \u201cTo be plucked from the millions of people who would have died to play Rey, and get through all those three films, and then moving on to the next phase of your filmmaking life as an actor \u2026 She\u2019s got a very eclectic bunch of tastes. I\u2019m just really lucky that she saw something in my pages.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAs for the future, Hilditch loves working in horror but is most drawn in to stories led by dynamic characters, no matter the genre.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI just love ordinary people caught in extraordinary situations,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is exactly an example of that. I definitely won\u2019t be going back into zombie tales anytime soon. I never thought I was going to make a zombie movie until I made \u2018We Bury the Dead.\u2019 I only wanted to do it if I was able to say something new or interesting. I think I managed to find a fresh enough way to give people the zombie lore that they all have come to expect, but to really pull the rug on your expectations at the same time. If it can still do that, that\u2019s an amazing thing in this modern age.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWatch the trailer for \u201cWe Bury the Dead\u201d below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No sound effect makes people squirm quite like grinding teeth. Zak Hilditch, who wrote and directed the new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217527,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[38556,146,85,46,397,38557,38558],"class_list":{"0":"post-217526","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-daisy-ridley","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-movies","13":"tag-we-bury-the-dead","14":"tag-zak-hilditch"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}