This is Michael Chaves, director of “The Curse of La

Llorona.”

All right.

In this scene, we have Chris, who’s

played by Roman Christou.

He has snuck out of his mom’s car.

And he’s walked over to this crime scene.

And while he’s there, he’s seeing this tragic scene.

And from behind him, he hears a woman crying.

And you know, the cry is one of the most signature

cues of La Llorona.

So it’s one of the first ways that we introduce her

to these different characters.

And her story and the legend is very tragic.

She is a mother who murdered her children

and is basically cursed to walk

the Earth for all eternity.

Intentionally, it was designed to be disarming and have

this kind of element of sadness to it.

And I thought that was really interesting in just,

you know, disarming the audience.

And then, with that head turn I

wanted to give it a little twist

into a moment of menace.

And even as she approaches him, what she’s saying

is very warm and nurturing, and it has

this motherly quality to it.

But it also has this dark menace.

And I thought that that just was a really fun way

to build the tension in the scene.

[horror film music]

[sound of skin burning]

With that jump scare, you know,

I think that what works with a good jump

scare is a little bit of sleight of hand.

I think that there is always an element of magic to it,

where you build an expectation that it’s

going to come from one direction

and then you turn it on its head

and bring it from another.

[banging on door]

In the car is Chris’s sister, Sam.

And Sam is played by Jaynee-Lynn Kinchen.

And the two kids, I think, are just great in this film.

I think that they bring so much charm and life to it.

It’s always fun to see them onscreen.

There isn’t much going on in the scene.

It is really the imagination of the menace outside

and what could potentially descend on them.

[shallow breathing sounds]

[car window creaking]

The windows rolling down, that was all in camera.

That was all rigged to roll down.

There wasn’t any visual effects in that.

And one of the ideas I loved is a car at night —

if you’re inside it, it’s oftentimes

a house of mirrors.

And so, to get that, we actually

coated the inside of the windows

with this reflective film to make those reflections

pop a little bit more.

[car window creaking]

I think that, really, what makes

you connect to the scene is Roman’s great performance.

It’s a very simple scene and it just

captures the imagination.

And, you know, I think that’s what really good scary movies

do and what makes fear oftentimes so powerful,

is just what you imagine.

[shallow breathing sounds]

[sound of car door unlocking]