Hayley Mills didn’t think she would star in a film ever again — but when M. Night Shyamalan comes knocking, you answer.
New Children's and Family Film Category Among Changes for Upcoming BAFTA 2025 Film Awards
“It was lovely to be on a movie set again,” the British actress tells The Hollywood Reporter . “There’s more space, you can take deeper breaths… And certainly, on a movie of Night’s, you don’t rush.”
Most will know Mills as a child star , whose early career blossomed with leading roles in movies like Tiger Bay (1959), Pollyanna (1960) and The Parent Trap (1961). Now, at 78 years old, she takes a turn into a genre much darker: hunting down a psychopathic serial killer Cooper ( Josh Hartnett , no less) who, upon taking his teenage daughter Riley (Ariel Donoghue) to a concert, finds himself caught in an enormous, FBI-orchestrated trap.
That’s the film. Trap is M. Night Shyamalan’s latest piece of work and, releasing in theaters on Friday, features Mills as FBI profiler Dr. Grant. “She’s brought in out of retirement to track down a serial killer, and she’s very experienced,” Mills says of her character. “She’s been lecturing and writing books and things about [killers] and I think her age is a relevant factor in the movie for the protagonist.”
Mills says her time away from film can be blamed on her age. The leading roles “just weren’t there” as she got into her 40s, 50s, and 60s, so she found work in television and the theater instead. “[ Trap ] came completely unexpected, I wasn’t sure if I’d ever make another movie — I wasn’t shedding any tears. People often look at you and think, ‘This is a Disney actress, isn’t it?'” But when her agent was in touch about Shyamalan’s next blockbuster, Mills was ready to dive back in: “It’s a part I would have never expected to be considered for.” Soon, after meeting with Trap ‘s casting director, Douglas Aibel, she was on a plane to Toronto.
“He’s the complete movie maker, from the beginning, middle, and end,” she says of The Sixth Sense director, who also wrote the film. “He understands the characters so very well. He knows their thought process. If you’re not thinking what he thinks your character should be thinking, he spots it instantly.”
Mills describes Trap as Shyamalan’s “ultimate vision,” adding that audiences will be entertained at the theater because of how cohesive the movie is. “It’s a movie that’s written, directed and funded by one man. It’s his movie. The sound, the music, is wonderful. And for somebody who shoulders so much, he’s so relaxed and funny and lovely and warm and encouraging and appreciative on the set.”
'Trap' Review: A Wily Josh Hartnett Propels M. Night Shyamalan's Moderately Entertaining Thriller
She says she had more big laughs on this set, with Shyamalan, than she’s had for years. A combination of “excitement, tension and laughter,” the film showcases another side to Hartnett, too. In their cat-and-mouse relationship in Trap , Hartnett taps into that frightening side necessary to portray a compelling killer. Even Mills had whiplash due to the star’s acting chops. “On-screen, he can change from being lovely, charming, that lovely smile. And then it goes. You see the calculating, cold killer. It’s a wonderful performance.”
Mills also explains that the connection between Cooper and Dr. Grant is “remote.” “I represent something specific for him, and he represents something specific for me,” she says. “I can’t really say much more because Warner Brothers will come down on me like a ton of bricks ( Laughs .)”
Playing a killer isn’t as easy as you think, she says. “It’s quite challenging. It’s like actors who have to play Hitler, they have to find a way to like themselves playing Hitler. They have to find a way to really believe and justify who they are and what they’re doing. You have to burrow into your deepest, darkest places. There’s a resistance to doing that. But I think Josh does that so well. You’ll see. He gets a balance between that darkness but also because he’s a naturally charming person and he’s got a great sense of humor.”
She tips her hat to Alison Pill, Hartnett’s wife in the film, and Donoghue, playing his teenage daughter, who was just 13 years old when they shot the movie. It’s a level of talent that Mills once had at a young age and — if M. Night Shyamalan’s opinion is anything to go by — still very much possesses today.
Read THR ‘s full review of Trap here .
'Knock at the Cabin' Scribes Tackling Horror Thriller 'Wilderness Reform' for Paramount (Exclusive)
Most Popular
Comments / 0