Bill Skarsgard is opening up about the physically and mentally demanding journey of making Locked, the claustrophobic horror thriller arriving on Lionsgate Play on September 5.
The actor takes on the role of Eddie, a thief whose attempt to steal a luxury car turns into a nightmarish battle of survival. As the heist unravels, Eddie finds himself trapped inside the vehicle, forced into a psychological game of endurance and terror manipulated by the chilling voice of Anthony Hopkins as William.
Reflecting on the shoot, Skarsgard admitted, “The movie was not an easy one. It’s me being tortured in a car for an hour and a half, but it was a great group, a great crew, and David’s amazing, and I’m very proud of what we have done here. It was fun. It’s a different type of role I don’t think I’ve done before, and I try to choose roles that feel unique and challenging in different ways.”
The film, directed by David Yarovesky and produced by Sam Raimi, Zainab Azizi, Petr Jákl, Ara Keshishian and Sean Patrick O’Reilly, leans heavily on Skarsgard’s solo performance. “There was something very unique about the script. It was essentially doing the whole movie without co-stars, and yes, we had the voice of Anthony Hopkins,” he explained. “Then one day I met with David, and we really just hit it off. He was like, ‘It’s just going to be you, me, and a car buddy,’ and that’s what it was. We leaned on each other in a massive way. It’s a very performance-driven movie. It was ten different colours of torture. The movie was challenging—it took its toll in a way.”
The shoot demanded unusual technical work as well. “We tried to find how many different corners one can use in this car for not a shot to repeat itself, and that was pretty hard,” Skarsgard said. “We also built a car on a stage where the walls would move apart so the camera could do things it physically couldn’t in that confined space.”
For Skarsgard, embodying Eddie meant pushing himself through physically draining sequences over four weeks of filming. “Like, I spent 4 weeks in that car, and there were moments like you are freezing to death, screaming in agony, being shot in the leg, or you are sweating profusely… And, I tried to give it 110% to each and every moment and tried to kind of feel that pain while I was doing it,” he recalled.
Despite the difficulty, the actor remains proud of the outcome. “It was obviously not easy, but I am happy with how it turned out and very thankful that I had David. He really was a partner in this one, and I loved the collaboration we had.”
