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James Wan describes his film Malignant as ‘the horror version’ of Disney’s Frozen, noting they both center on love stories between two sisters.
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Malignant.
James Wan has described his latest film, Malignant, as the horror equivalent to Disney’s animated blockbuster Frozen.
Annabelle Wallis stars in Malignant as Madison or “Maddie,” a woman haunted by visions of grisly murders committed by a sinister figure known as Gabriel. With the help of her adopted sister, Sydney (Maddie Hasson), Maddie uncovers the bizarre truth: Gabriel is Maddie’s twin brother and an extreme version of a teratoma that she shares a brain with. But, as Wan noted during a press conference attended by ComicBook.com, it’s Maddie and Sydney’s relationship that forms the emotional core of the movie.
“Well, it felt like it was the most natural one, given the theme of the movie, given the subject matter of the film,” said Wan. “Here you have a story about Madison with her own blood relation, her own blood sibling, which has Gabriel, who turns out to be a horrible person. But yet her adopted sister, not blood relation in any way, is actually the one that she has the most connection with. That is the one that is the most loving. And I felt like that was such a cool story to come at it from that perspective.”
Wan, who co-wrote the story for Malignant with his wife Ingrid Bisu and Akela Cooper, emphasized that Malignant was always meant to be a platonic love story. “And for Ingrid, she loves the idea of telling a love story, but it’s not a romantic story between the two leads. It’s a love story between the two sisters. And I love that. I haven’t quite seen that in a horror movie at least to this degree,” said Wan.
“And it’s funny that we jokingly refer to it as, it’s like the horror version of Frozen. It’s like Anna and [Elsa]. But it really is like the horror version of Frozen,” he added. “It’s sisterly love, it’s sisterly bond. And one of the many themes that the film deal with is the idea that can you be close to the people that you don’t necessarily share blood relation with? And what we want to kind of say in this film is it’s possible.”
Malignant ends with Maddie re-taking control of her body just as Gabriel is about to murder Sydney, locking him away in a prison within her mind and embracing Sydney, assuring her she will always be her sister. “Madison travels the whole movie, basically, to find that sort of blood connection, that lost kin. And when she finally finds it, she goes, ‘Oh, the person that I love the most has been right in front of me the whole time. And she’s always been by my side, she’s always been with me,'” said Wan. “And we just felt like that was something that was important for the film.”
Malignant is now playing in theaters and streaming on HBO Max.
Source: ComicBook.com
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