Ali Larter Talks Survival in Her New Film, The Last Victim

0

Ali Larter has been involved in a few battles throughout her career. She took on the supernatural in House on Haunting Hill, squared off with Death in Final Destination, took down zombies in the Resident Evil series, helped save the world in Heroes, and tussled with Beyonce in Obsessed. Now Larter is taking on outlaws in the Southwest U.S. in the new action thriller, The Last Victim.

In the film, Larter portrays Susan, an anthropologist with OCD who is hunted down by a gang of criminals through the New Mexico desert after they murder her husband (Tahmoh Penikett). She was immediately drawn to the character when she read the script. “I loved that it was a NEO-Western and a survival-thriller. You have a woman that is a type-A, controlled person who’s thrust into the wilderness and is forced to kind of come to grips with her own morality and what she’ll do to survive. That was really the heart of what got excited me about this movie.”

MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY

The Last Victim is writer/director Naveen Chathapuram’s first feature film, and Larter praises his passion for the craft. “He really enjoys all aspects of filmmaking, and he loves working with actors,” she says. “He really enjoyed the rehearsals and understanding the backstory of the characters. When you’re actually in the moment and doing a scene, he’s willing to cut any fat and really get to the heart of what the scene is. He was just so enthusiastic about this project.”

While the character of Susan is incredibly organized, obsessively relying on lists, the same can’t be said of Larter. “I’m such a mess,” she says. “You cannot see the floor in my closet, I’m not great at making my bed, my dish, my sink gets filled with dishes. It’s just it’s not my strong suit. But I’m intense when it comes to controlling and planning. So that is the other side of it for me. I like to have a plan. And it’s easy to kind of fall into what we think is control when you do that, but the reality is that we can’t control any of it. One of the things that you see with Susan is that she learns that there’s no such thing as under control. You have to just live in the present and roll with the punches, so that’s something that I definitely kind of related to with her.”


All About the Action

The action scenes in The Last Victim are considerably more grounded than many other films in the genre, which Larter appreciated. “One of my favorite scenes is when I go into a storage trailer, and I’m getting shot at. You see Susan come back and hit him with the light bulb, and we fall out of the trailer together, which is followed by a gun scuffle. That was something that we meticulously choreographed with the stunt coordinator. It was just really fun for me because you’re dealing with the revolver and you’re dealing with the glass of the light bulb, and then the wrestling of it was a little bit messy and a little dirty. I thought it looked great.”

Larter is no stranger to stunt work, and The Last Victim was no different. “I love it,” she says. “Count me in always. With Resident Evil, they allowed me to do anything I was up for. One of my favorite stunts in Resident Evil was with Axeman, which we did in the rain, running and flipping over on wires. I love all that.”


In 2010, Larter took home a Golden Popcorn Award at the MTV Movie & TV Awards for her fight with Beyoncé in the film Obsessed, though she notes that her fight in that film and the fight scenes in The Last Victim have very few similarities. “They are totally different,“ says Larter. “This is raw and brutal. In one scene, in particular, you see this carnal nature in her the spirit of veracity come out, and really step into this other person. Obsessed was a glossier film, and Lisa was, psychotic, focused, and driven. In this movie, you see more of the turning point, and you see this kind of warrior in her emerge.”

Related: 11 Most Iconic Action Heroines in Movie History

Character Work

While Susan is forced to evolve into survival mode, the film does not shy away from showing her vulnerability and fear, and while the was partially on paper, she brought certain elements to the screen as well. “Some of it was in the script, but it was really important to me when you talk about the arc of this character, that you saw how vulnerable she was, and how uncomfortable she was in the situation, and how unknown this world was to her, and how unprepared she was to be thrust into this,” she says. “When her world is crumbling around her, she’s not just sitting there stoic and holding it in. It’s important to show emotion. I wanted to show without words, her go from whimpering and breaking down to finding the warrior within herself.”


The film also stars Ron Perlman (Hellboy franchise, Beauty and the Beast), as a local sheriff who is trying to track down the gang of outlaws, led by Ralph Ineson (The Green Knight, The Witch, Chernobyl), both of whom Larter loved working with. “I thought Ralph was totally maniacal and amazing,” she says. “Particularly his monologues about the choices that you make and what they lead to, and the themes of people living in isolation and the choices that you make. I think he’s such a strong actor. I think that we’ve even put together a great cast of character actors. Ron is unbelievable the second he steps onto the screen. Kyle Schmid was wonderful, and so was Tahmoh Penikett. All of these actors really bring the story to life.”

Another character in the film is the location, Kelowna, Canada, doubling for the desert of New Mexico. According to Larter, working in the elements can be difficult, but can also aid in the performances. “It’s like a high desert area, so it ended up getting really cold at night,” says Larter. “By the end of shooting, it was also snowing. I’m not looking for the posh plush. I love when I’m in the elements. It’s raw and visceral. I’ve shot movies on a soundstage the whole time and have to conjure these things up. As an actress, I prefer to be in the elements.”

Larter has been acting for over two decades, and at this point in her career, she is looking for roles that allow her to explore various aspects of being a woman. “I’m not a mother in this role, and I don’t usually get to show that aspect of myself, but I love strong female stories, so I’m constantly looking for that, to be able to allow women to continue to be unveiled in that way,” she says. “In my career, I’ve often played roles that could have been written for a man, so it’s important to me, as I get older, that women are still allowed to kick some ass. Don’t throw me to the pasture. I still got a lot of fighting me.”

The Last Victim is currently available on VOD.


Jim Varney Documentary The Importance of Being Ernest Launches Kickstarter Campaign

John Cherry, Creator of Jim Varney’s Ernest, Dies at 73

Read Next


About The Author

Source link

Leave A Reply

Your email address will not be published.