INT: Saskia Mulder

Last Updated on July 28, 2021

This
coming Friday is the official release of, in my humble opinion, one
of the best films I’ve seen this year (or last year if you’re from
the UK), THE
DESCENT!
With an amazing ensemble cast, the brilliant Neil Marshall
second feature is a good as horror gets.
This is one of those rare films that has the gore but is
loaded with everything else that makes a movie great.
So yes, I urge you to go see it… you’ll thank me later.

And
in the past few days I got a chance to have some one on one time
with the beautiful and talented Saskia Mulder who plays climbing
expert Rebecca in the film. It
was her first time in Los
Angeles and she had high praise for her experience here so far.
Warm, funny and smart, she was perfectly cast in a film with
incredibly beautiful women who truly have the talent to back it up.
It was truly a pleasure getting to chat about the opening,
mountain climbing and how cool horror fans are.
She defiantly made a fan of me.
By the way; did I mention… Go see this movie!

Saskia
Mulder

The
Descent opens here in the states this Friday, are you nervous…
excited?

I
think mainly excited. There’s
something with this whole film, it’s just been such a pleasant
surprise, one after the other. I
literally went from receiving the script and meeting with Neil and
he had made Dog Soldiers before so that I kind of knew that this one
was going to be good but working with five other girls, could be
either good surprise or bad surprise.
It was a very good surprise.
And then it doing so well and being critically, really quite
acclaimed and it kind of seems like, for a small budget British film
this thing has just been going huge.
So, I’m just kind of riding the wave.

So
working with the five other girls, what was that like?
In a genre where the women are sometimes dumb, scared…

I
know. I was saying that
to my friend yesterday that that’s one of the things I loved about
this film is that all the girls in it are very capable.
We don’t do anything stupid, well, granted besides going
into the cave. But
there’s no… I always have this thing that I absolutely hate in
the female contribution to horror films where it kind of seems to
be, the scenario is, there are five murderers in the house and the
girl goes, “Oh my God, I forgot my handbag!”
And I’m like, go in bitch and die you’re too stupid, you
deserve to die. [Laughs]
So that was a great thing because it’s not that often that you get
to do a film with only girls where it’s not just about the good
looking girls in spandex and, you know, it’s nice that that’s
there too, but there’s something quite empowering about these
girls just being human, just being clever and capable.

Well,
they’re very well written, they’re layered, these are not you’re
typical average stereotypes.

Yeah.
There’s very little what I always call profile acting, you
know that thing [posing for the camera] and I think that’s how it
should be and I love going into make-up and getting my
"mud". There
was very little mascara going on in my part and that’s very
liberating because I think in Europe you do have that a little bit
less but it is very focused on looks and that’s fine and I like
that too but there’s something quite cool about just being
outright dirty, and its fun.

How
were the working conditions? You
worked at the studio…

It
was so hard. So hard.
The thing is, it’s a studio, sounds warm, but you’ve got
all these security things where basically there’s these huge
hangers and these huge doors that if it’s two degrees outside then
it’s two degrees inside and we were soaking the whole day and it
was just so hard and I’m not a wussy but after like week five of
making really long days it was physically very, very tough.
And being absolutely drenched and cold, there were just times
like, “You’ve gotta be kidding me!” and when the make-up
artist comes to you again and is like hosing you down [Laughs] (the
make-up artists are) enjoying this. [Laughs]

But
there is something about working with five girls, with six and five
other girls, we were all kind of tough and we were all kind of
trying to out do each other. Not
in a nasty way but kind of something where if no one else is
complaining… “No, I’m not gonna say anything.
No, no, I’m fine!” So
it kind of was stimulating, you know when you work with five other
girls and one starts moaning and being like a real girlie girl then
that’s it. There’s
gonna be no end. So, it
was great.

Have
you guys remained friends?

Yeah.
It’s funny because it’s one of the things you wish for
but we really have. Were
really seeing each other on a regular basis and we celebrate our
birthdays together, it’s really nice.
I think one thing that, with this film, that it really bonded
us because six girls together can really be a recipe for disaster,
well cause it only takes one that has to be a bit conniving and
that’s a really bad thing but because of all the training we did
for the film. If
you’re hanging somewhere a hundred meters up and your new best
friend of half an hour is holding the rope, you better trust each
other, because it’s so scary.

And
none of us are wussies but, you’re learning how to climb,
there’s moments where you hit (the fear) where you’re hanging
there and suddenly you’re looking down and everything started
trembling and all you wanna do is cry out for your mom [Laughs].
And it’s literally the other girls that are standing at the
bottom going, “Come on. You
can do it!” so it’s a very bonding experience.
They have like, you know in businesses they do that, to have
teams formed… and we kind of had one of those through the
climbing. And I think it
shows on the screen as well, I think you can kind of see that
there’s a real connection.

Absolutely.
Now with the climbing, have you ever climbed before?

I
had actually, I had only once. And
Neil (Marshall) loves teasing me about it that when I came into the
audition obviously I played it up a bit.
So now it’s like, “So I’ve been climbing the Everest
lately.” [Laughs]
But I had climbed once and I was struck by how much I liked
it because I have a little bit (of a) fear of heights so it’s
definitely a case of look upward and never look downward.
There’s something beautiful about when you’re climbing in
nature as opposed to climbing walls, it sounds really weird but you
kind of feel one with the rock.
It’s really odd.

No,
I don’t think so; I know what you’re talking about.
It’s like surfing or anything like that when you’re out
there…

You
become one with the element.

Yeah.

It’s
kind of where human beings are supposed to be, in nature.
You know, were not created to be living in air-conditioning.
[Laughs] But I just
really enjoyed it. But
one of the other things we did for the preparation was actual caving
and that was one of the greatest experiences ever.

You’re
not terrified of that?

It’s
very strange because that’s what everybody said because it was
really, really, really deep. And
you actually went into the crawlspaces.
The scenes, like in the film, where there was literally a
little river going. So
you really had to… you could only have you’re head like that
[lifting her head] cause if you went like that [bringing her head
down] you’d be having water and you couldn’t go more like that
[lifting her head up higher] cause it was so tight, I mean really
like [moving through the cave] centimeter per centimeter cause the
trainer who also trained us for the climbing kind of pulled a trick
because we were all so boyish while we were learning how to climb
and (he was) like, okay let’s see how much, how crazy they really
are.

So
he sent us in this thing, he’s like, oh you’ll see when your
there; he never expected us to go that far.
So we were, six of us in a row, this was the only time where
it’s like okay, mind over matter and just breathe, continue
breathing one breath at a time and that was seriously freaky.
So we were crawling and then, the girl in the front goes,
“Alright guys, we’ve reached the end.
We’ve gotta go back.”
And then, it was the one part it was like… Oh my God!

Did
you have fun with all the special effects and all the gore?

It
was fun. [Laughs]
Honestly, it’s just fun and they were so talented.
These guys are just incredible.

Had
you done horror before?

Never,
never… and also I was never a huge horror fan, I’m a squeamish
girl. [Laughs] I need to sleep at night, I get too scared but Neil,
kind of during the rehearsal period, he sat us down after rehearsal
and made us watch a lot of horror films.
And that was in a castle in Scotland where it was honestly
like The Shining.

Ah,
neat.

Yeah,
nice [Laughs]; and the rumor went that it was haunted.
I don’t know if it was any one of us that got that rumor
into the world but it was just really freaky.

Anything
happen? No ghost showed up?

[Laughs]
No. But actually there
were a couple of people who had, you know, were feeling presences.
I’m too down to earth for that… unless I see the actual
chair flying the room, I ain’t havin’ it.
[Laughs]

Now,
with the “crawlers”, you didn’t see them for awhile, did you?

No.
We were absolutely forbidden to see them and I think he (Neil
Marshall) was quite right because for us, we had the tension of
knowing that we were going to see them… it makes it a lot more
exciting, it makes it more scary.
And when it got to the point of knowing, you know you’re
looking at the script that day and you’re going to see the
crawlers and Neil (said), girls, you’re going to be seeing the
crawlers today and you know, basically react however you want
because he wanted to film our natural reaction.

And
by the time it comes to seeing the crawlers, within a second, all of
us are on the other side of the studio cause we’re so freaked out.
They were just so scary.
They were, honestly, they were so freaky because they’re
real people, you know, it’s different when its computer animated.
But for the first two days honestly I couldn’t talk to
them, they were just so scary. And
then, you know that kind of goes away, but within a week; these poor
guys walking around butt naked and its two degrees, and they can’t
have a blanket or anything because they have six hour make-up and we
kept going… “You want a cup of tea?”
So we got kind of mumsy with the crawlers which is very
funny, when you see them because they’re so heinous.

Very
seldom do movie monsters live up to being actually scary, but they
do here.

Yeah,
but I think because they were still kind of… you could see the
humanity in them. Because
they are people obviously and I think there’s something, kind of,
when it doesn’t become too outrageous.
Cause there is also something I think with films, the things
that are really scary are things that might actually happen.
It could be that if you go caving that the cave could
collapse and who knows what lives there, you know, we don’t know
what’s in the universe, there’s still things we discover, who
knows? And I think that
thing of… that there’s a possibility of… that makes it really
freaky. I mean,
obviously most people wouldn’t go into a cave anyway so it
doesn’t really matter. [Laughs]

Do
you go caving often, now?

You
know, it’s funny because after going caving for real, I just loved
it; it was one of the best days of my life.
And after actually seeing the film, I’m a bit doubtful.
[Laughs] And also, you never hear good things about caving,
you know whenever (there are) cavings in the news (it) is when they
lose someone.

That’s
true.

And
it’s kind of like, it’s just kind of not very clever, I think.

Yeah.

But
I must say that the film had a lot to do with it.

I’m
sure.

[Laughs]
Cause I really loved it because you go into these places and it’s
not just rock, you’ve got waterfalls and fossils.
It’s just absolutely amazing.

Sounds
amazing.

It
is absolutely beautiful. It’s
funny, not doing, but since seeing the film, I’m like [shaking her
head] nah. [Laughs]

You
were saying you’re not a big fan of horror so what was it like
growing up in Holland, is horror popular there?

It’s
not so much about me not being a fan, I get too scared.
You know, I see a film and I’m
laughing, crying, I’m crying more than the people on screen,
kind of thing. So if I
see a horror film I just get really freaked out.
But I must say that through seeing them quite a lot, I’m just
really starting to respect the genre.
I really see the difference between the good ones and the bad
ones. And I think in
Holland it’s kind of like in America where right now, it’s becoming
more mainstream with films like Scream that are getting more…

Popular…

Exactly.
Wider (release) like Saw.
Before there was kind of like a really hardcore horror base,
you see all the films. That’s
one thing I absolutely find fascinating doing this film is that the
people that really love horror, they know everything.
They know EVERYTHING, and I’m like, "Oh my God, you know
more about my film than I do."
It’s really quite admirable, people have a real passion for
it.

Well,
they love it because its such a… the genre definitely gets looked
down upon.

Not
anymore I think.

You
don’t think so?

No.
I think it’s really changing, I mean, maybe I’m saying that
because it’s from my perspective.

You
also did a very good film.

Yeah,
that’s true. Exactly.
Exactly. That
does make a difference.

How
much has your life changed since The Descent had been released?

Ahhh.

Like
you’re doing interviews right now…

Exactly.
Exactly. But I
was in a television show in England so that kind of thing I kind of
had before, but what I do realize now is that… meetings are a lot
more easy to get. [Laughs]
And also because I got to do some of my own stunts in the
film, you kind of get to be, you know, when I do that thing I’m
crossing, that’s really me.

That’s
awesome.

Yeah,
I know. It’s so rare for
a girl to be able to do that. So
you kind of get into a different league where before I’d always be
doing the goofy comedy bit whereas now I’m getting more into action
and serious roles. And
people tend to go a lot… "I know you from somewhere."
[Laughs] But
otherwise it’s not like your life actually changes, but I don’t
know, we’ll see… it might still.