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Backrooms star Renate Reinsve revealed she was a little concerned she "would actually go a little bit insane" working on the 30,000-square-foot practical set.
Posted in: A24, Movies | Tagged: Backrooms
Backrooms Star Was Concerned The Practical Set Would Drive Her Insane
Backrooms star Renate Reinsve revealed she was a little concerned she "would actually go a little bit insane" working on the 30,000-square-foot practical set.
Article Summary
- Backrooms star Renate Reinsve said the film’s 30,000-square-foot practical set was so eerie she feared going insane.
- Reinsve explained the massive Backrooms set helped create the unsettling, off-kilter atmosphere the horror story needs.
- She also teased that Backrooms is surprisingly existential, exploring culture, AI, technology, and distorted psychology.
- Backrooms filmed in just over a month, with the ambitious A24 horror movie racing into theaters on May 29.
The entire concept of Backrooms is supposed to mess with your perception of space, which is something that you can't really fake. Space and the sense that it's just a little bit off, when a room isn't quite right or a hallway is a little too long, these sensations are like the uncanny valley. They are incredibly subtle, and you can't really fake them. So if you're going to make the concept of Backrooms work, you need to build the backrooms, which means spending some time in seriously large and unsettling places. Some people really don't like large, empty spaces like that, and it sounds like Renate Reinsve is one of them. She got the chance to speak to GamesRadar+ about how the practical, 30,000-square-foot set impacted her performance and revealed that she was a little concerned about her own mental health.
"I was a little concerned that I would actually go a little bit insane in there, and that would be good for the character," Reinsve explained. "I don't think I've ever seen anyone that excited when I came on set. [Kane] was just, like, tripping, seeing what he had built on his computer, built around us – and it was truly a scary, eerie place to be. I wouldn't actually go alone anywhere."
In the age of VFX and things like the Volume, a set that big is worth noting, and it's what will set Backrooms apart. The other things that will elevate this film are the cast and the themes it explores with the buckwild premise. The marketing has done a pretty good job of not telling us much, and Reinsve did her best to do the same.
"It's surprisingly existential on a lot of different levels. I think you can read it into a lot of things, the way culture and AI and technology is developing," she continued. "There's this extrapolated world, where you don't see an ending to it, that is scary. [But] it's also about the psychology of these characters and how things can get distorted but kind of look the same, and how you sometimes can only make sense of something irrational with something else that is irrational. It has a lot of layers."
One of the nice things about horror specifically is that the best films are minimalistic and can be done quick and dirty, which is very good for extremely tight production schedules. Filming took place for just over a month from July 25, 2025, to August 14, 2025, and a mere nine months later, the final film is set to be released in theaters.
Backrooms: Summary, Cast List, Release Date
A strange doorway appears in the basement of a furniture showroom.
From writer/director Kane Parsons and starring Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve, Mark Duplass, Finn Bennett, and Lukita Maxwell. BACKROOMS – In Theaters May 29
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