Jon Wright tells RadioTimes.com that the closing sequence of his new horror film is “one of the craziest things I’ve ever shot”. **WARNING: This article contains spoilers for Unwelcome**
This week sees the arrival of brand new horror flick Unwelcome in UK and Irish cinemas – a film that takes inspiration from Irish folklore to create something that director Jon Wright has described as a “Grimm fairytale for adults”.
It tells the story of Maya (Hannah John-Kamen) and Jamie (Douglas Booth), a couple who are attacked in their own London flat shortly after they discover they are expecting a baby, leading them to move away from the city.
Instead, they settle in a seemingly idyllic cottage in the Irish countryside formerly owned by Jamie’s late aunt, only for it to emerge that they now share a garden with a bunch of mysterious – and incredibly violent – little creatures known as Red Caps.
Over the course of the film, the Red Caps begin to increasingly interfere in their lives, leading to a shocking conclusion that Wright says is “one of the craziest things I’ve ever shot”.
We spoke exclusively with Wright about that ending and how the film almost closed with a couple of additional scenes – read on for everything you need to know, with the warning that there are major spoilers for Unwelcome ahead.
Unwelcome ending explained
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During the film, Maya and Jamie find themselves increasingly at odds with the builders fixing the hole in the roof of their cottage – Daddy Whelan (Colm Meaney) and his three children Eoin (Kristian Nairn), Aisling (Jamie-Lee O’Donnell) and Killian (Chris Walley).
In one scene, after we see Eoin violently beaten by Daddy, Maya attempts to comfort him in the woods only for him to force himself on her. Thankfully, the Red Caps come to her rescue, intervening and dragging Eoin away – later depositing his decapitated head in Maya and Jamie’s cottage.
The rest of the Whelans think that Maya and Jamie must have done something with Eoin and so they break into the cottage, leading to a massive fight, exacerbated when Maya accidentally drops the severed head and it is noticed by Aisling.
Maya then runs to the woods at the bottom of their garden and approaches the Red Caps’ home, where she begs them for help. When she returns to the cottage, the Red Caps do indeed assist in fighting off the Whelans, killing each of them – and after the carnage, Maya gives birth to her child.
Of course, it doesn’t end there. The Red Caps need payment for their help and so come and steal the baby away, with Maya then chasing after them and entering their home. Inside she discovers an old woman, who turns out to be the long-lost daughter of their cottage’s previous owner (Jamie’s aunt), who had been taken by the Red Caps long ago and now serves as their queen.
Maya naturally doesn’t want to let the creatures keep her child, and so she begins to do battle with the Red Caps, eventually brutally killing the old woman by crushing her skull. This seems to make the Red Caps respect Maya, and they follow her back to the cottage – where the baby has now been safely returned.
In the cottage garden, they dance around her and pour the blood of the dead woman over her, seemingly anointing her as their new Queen – while Jamie looks on in a state of shock. The film ends with a close-up of Maya’s face, with it clear that she is now the leader of the Red Caps.
Director Jon Wright unpacks the Unwelcome ending
Discussing the ending with RadioTimes.com, Jon Wright explained that the initial idea was for the film to run on a little further after Maya has become the Red Cap Queen.
“In the earlier drafts of the script, there was a little coda at the end so that wasn’t the final scene,” he said. “There was a little coda where you saw what happened in their everyday lives after that.
“But [the actual ending] felt like such a sort of enormous, surreal, mind-boggling scene, so we didn’t shoot that other final scene, we changed it and we decided let’s land here, let’s make this the ending of the movie and let’s just make sure that we hit all the beats so that everybody understands what’s happened and where we’ve gotten to.”
He added that the ending was “one of the craziest things I’ve ever shot” and revealed that he felt like he “was pushing the boat out and going to the kind of surreal edge, the psychedelic edge of what’s possible in a horror film”, taking inspiration from some of his heroes including David Lynch and David Cronenberg.
“I kept thinking this feels so far out that somebody’s going to stop me in a minute and say, ‘Hold on, you’ve got to tone this down, and you got to rein it back,'” Wright added. “I was kind of expecting a little tug on my sleeve that you sometimes get when you’re making a television programme and the executives think you’ve kind of gone off-piste.
“But I never got that tug – in fact, I’d say a big thank you to all the people who financed the movie because they were very supportive of my out-there vision and they seemed to really like it. When the rushes came in I didn’t really get any negative comments, I just got a lot of support.”
He continued that his favourite thing about the ending was just how unpredictable it is, stating that he doesn’t believe many cinemagoers will be able to work out what direction it is headed in.
“I hope that the ending feels satisfying, and I hope it feels like it makes sense – that there was a logical progression getting there,” he said. “But I kind of defy anybody to predict that ending, I don’t think people will see it coming. Often I find with modern movies, particularly the more expensive blockbusters, they’re quite formulaic and quite often you have a pretty good idea of where the story is going. You don’t know whether it’s going to be A or B, but you know it’s going to be one of those two options.
“And I’d like to think with this movie, there’s no real way of predicting the ending. And I’m looking forward to talking to people about the film after they’ve seen it just to find out if there is anybody who did actually guess that ending, because I would be amazed. But let’s see!”
Unwelcome is currently showing in UK cinemas. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to see what’s on tonight.
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