Subverting Expectations by Clashing Different Genres: A Conversation with ‘Leave the World Behind’ Writer-Director Sam Esmail

In this apocalyptic thriller from award-winning writer and director Sam Esmail (Mr. Robot), Amanda (Academy Award winner Julia Roberts) and her husband Clay (Academy Award nominee Ethan Hawke), rent a luxurious home for the weekend with their kids, Archie (Charlie Evans) and Rose (Farrah Mackenzie). Their vacation is soon upended when two strangers — G.H. (Academy Award winner Mahershala Ali) and his daughter Ruth (Myha’la) — arrive in the night, bearing news of a mysterious cyberattack and seeking refuge in the house they claim is theirs. The two families reckon with a looming disaster that grows more terrifying by the minute, forcing everyone to come to terms with their places in a collapsing world. 

Based on the National Book Award-nominated novel by Rumaan Alam, LEAVE THE WORLD BEHIND is produced by Esmail Corp, Red Om Films, and executive produced by Higher Ground Productions.

Unsettled. That's the word that immediately comes to mind while sitting through this film, and that's without a doubt, what filmmaker Sam Esmail wants you to feel. While you sit on the edge of your seat in anticipation, your mind is also riddled with questions, scenarios, and the "what ifs" conundrums, all the while you attempt to arrange and rearrange this puzzle. The tension is palpable from character standoffs to the incredibly nuanced and heightened sound design. Who do you trust and what do you trust when the world is ending? And once you get to the end (no spoilers here)...well quite frankly, we may see a resurgence in physical media, thanks to Sam. 

Sam Esmail spoke with Script about how he always wanted to do a disaster film about a cyberattack and how author Rumaan Alam's book was the perfect material to adapt. On top of talking about the adaptation process, Sam shares his process of how he tackles building and breaking tension, his collaboration with key department heads, and what emotions he wanted to evoke from the audience heightening visuals and sound.

This interview has been edited for content and clarity.

Sadie Dean: How did this book come on your radar, and what about the material attracted you to it in wanting to adapt it?

Sam Esmail: This is early days of the pandemic, and in the back of my head, I had always wanted to do a disaster film about a cyberattack because I thought there was something deeply disturbing and psychological about how our over-reliance on technology could be used against us in a really catastrophic way. So that's sort of been percolating in the back of my head.

When my agent gave me a copy of Leave the World Behind - and one of the special things about the book was how the crisis is never explained or understood - I immediately saw the parallels between the two ideas because, as cyberattacks could be sort of equal parts, ominous and cryptic; but the other thing I'd say the main thing about the book, the world, the characters, they all seem so authentic and a true product of modern society. There's also the sort of theme of uncertainty that's in the book. And I love the way Rumaan [Alam] played with that idea and used it to pit these really interesting characters against each other while society is crumbling all around them. And so that kind of afforded me this exciting opportunity to invert what a typical disaster film looks like by centering the film on the characters living through the sort of unknown crisis and making the disaster elements secondary to the story.

Sadie: The characters are so rich, from their own development and dynamics. And I love that they each have their own kind of inner goal, mission, whatever that may be. And then that ending, for me, it's just a chef's kiss, it couldn’t have ended any other way.

Sam: [laughs]

Sadie: In terms of developing those characters from the book and getting it on the page as a feature, what kind of creative liberties did you have to do in further developing those backstories and those voices on the page, if at all?

Sam: Well, I have to say that the characters are so specific and well-drawn in the book that it honestly was easy. That was the easiest part to adapt from into the screenplay. And the one change I made was changing Ruth from the wife, because she's G.H.'s wife in the book and I changed her to the daughter. Because that was one of the first things I thought about after writing the screenplay the idea that this film was going to explore humanity grappling with the fragility of society, I wanted to include as many points of view as possible. So making Ruth Gen Z-millennial sort of verging on Gen Z was just a way of adding to that panoramic view of what a collapse would feel like through different eyes and across different generations.

But you know, past that, it was honestly, casting, I mean, to be honest with you, I got really lucky because I just essentially had this A-list elite team of incredible actors that then brought everything that was on the page to life in this really unexpected and thrilling way. And so my job on set was to find any way to get out of their way and let them do their thing and just sit back and watch the fireworks.

Sadie: Having observed your writing style for years, you have this really great way of building and breaking tension – it’s like an art form. How do you approach that, from what's on the page, and then how do you translate that to the screen?

Sam: Yeah, whenever you're doing anything with it, especially in the suspense thriller genre, if you want to describe it that way - for me, it's all about how much information do you dole out to the audience? How much do you keep? And it's just a calculation of, ‘Is this going to frustrate that there's too behind the story, or is this going to be too obvious and they're going to be way ahead?’ So, it's always walking a tightrope.

And there's three sorts of avenues to look at that which is, one - what do the characters know that the other characters don't know? And I love it when characters have secrets. So not only does that provide tension between the characters, but that also sort of drives the mystery more so the audience is comparing notes. They know that G.H. knows this and they know that Amanda knows this. And if they both knew that those two pieces of information they could probably come up with more answers to the mystery. And so, there's a way to kind of use that at your disposal to sort of really drag out the suspense.

And then I would say the next key thing is showing the audience. And this is something that none of the characters know and so you're using that to sort of drag the audience along. And then the last thing is just tone. It's finding a way to keeping that tone, really undefinable because if you start falling into the trappings of, ‘OK we're making a thriller,’ it's gonna have this certain kind of music and certain kind of tropes, it sort of starts to engender a level of predictability that detracts from the tension you're trying to build with the audience.

So, for me, it's always about finding ways to subvert expectations by clashing different genres, tones, and styles together. So there's an alchemy you're creating that feels unique to the movie. And so, what that affords you is this sort of like an indelible sense of disorientation and anticipation for the audience, because when you're watching a film, and you don't know what's going to happen next, but at the same time desperately want to, that's probably the most exhilarating experience you can give an audience.

Sadie: 100%. Going back to that adaptation process, breaking this up into five chapters in the movie and using that as a storytelling framing device, how did you land on that decision?

Sam: Yeah, that's interesting, because that actually did not happen in the writing, that actually happened in post. And I think there's something about the film that sort of structurally defies the three act structure. It actually kind of and I'd say, this is an old Hollywood thing, but I think Tarantino actually still employs it - it actually felt more right to me to really view the film as more of a five act structure because the cadence of the movie felt very much like - there was three story days in the movie, right, so it's a very compressed storyline. Yet there are these things that kind of escalate and then drop off and escalate and drop off and because we're focusing on the characters, and not necessarily the sort of more action-oriented disaster film, it really needed to be a different sort of tempo than what you would traditionally get in a three act structure. So, I made a conscious decision in post to really break this up into five parts so that the audience could kind of match the tempo we were going for in the other room.

Sadie: It works so well in this film. And as many say the edit is always that final rewrite. Let’s dive into the sound design and tone of the film. There's this great symbiosis between camera movement and angles and the sound design. What was that creative collaboration process with your key team, from your DP to the production design, and sound design team, and making sure to keep the stakes high with tonal consistency?

Sam: So ultimately, my whole feeling, whenever I talk to any department head, is how do we involve the audience in the story to the sort of nth degree to and into - even into this specifically this film - to maybe an even uncomfortable extent. [laughs] Because the thing about this film is the characters are so on edge because of the uncertainty that's going around them, because of the uncertainty that's even within the house. Because there's such a lack of trust between the characters, that everything feels heightened.

And it's not just a regular setting, the setting is such that the anxieties and fears and even the opposite, the desperation, all kind of rise to an 11. And so, I wanted to really, really bring the audience in as visceral a way that would match the sort of intensity that the characters were feeling. So, I kind of set that bar pretty high with everyone. 

And so when, for example, when Tod Campbell, my cinematographer and I were talking about a camera move you know, just to give a small example, when Julia's character, Amanda first starts exploring the house in the beginning of the film, it's meant to be this sort of joyous occasion and she's taking in this beautiful home that she's rented for the weekend. And we're kind of flipping the camera around to kind of match this dizzying sort of joy about this home, but as the camera is swooping around, it almost does it to a sickening extent. And that's sort of the edge that we always try to find is that well, is this really...[laughs] you know, it's starting to question, ‘OK, are we really seated in a comfortable position or is this really going to be a fun weekend away from home?’

And it was that same sort of goal that we were trying to do with the music where I think I remember telling Mac [Quayle] to just keep pushing it - kind of overdo it. And the same with the sound design. Every element - we mixed in Dolby Atmos which I think has something like 21 speakers above and around you. And in every scene even - and typically those are really used mostly in action sequences - but in every scene and even as something innocuous as just in the pool and they're in the kitchen cleaning up, we're hearing every speaker in the theater playing the environment, the birds outside, the water and the ripples in the pool, and all of that is adding this extra sensation that hopefully pushes you to kind of a more heightened, maybe more on edge experience. 

And there's sort of subtle subtleties that I think we played so well with in the beginning with all of those elements that sort of add up, hopefully, to sort of keep that suspense and tension growing and escalating until we get to the end.

Sadie: It does. I keep thinking of the camera work in this, especially the askew camera angles. And I feel like as a viewer, there's moments we're like this surveillance camera, depending on the angles we're getting. And it kind of reminds me of a few specific shots in Fritz Lang's M, where it's just a little askew, you're still observing what's happening with these characters, and you're kind of in the room but you're not. It's really cool experience to have as a viewer.

Sam: Thank you. That's really nice to hear. Thank you.

Sadie: What do you hope audiences take away from watching this film?

Sam: Oh, that's a really good question. I would say that if you think about storytelling, or if you think about those sort of ritualistic campfire tales, where you sort of can speak about your fears as a way to warn each other but also sort of come together as a community to work through the trauma of those fears, I kind of consider this just as another campfire tale that speaks to the uncertainty of how we feel about the world today. And regardless of your beliefs, or what you're aligned with politically, religiously, racially, there seems to be a wide consensus that there's a lot of fractures in our world. And there's a lot of uncertainty on how we're going to heal those divisions. 

And I think a story like this could provoke conversation and make us look at relationships and the relationships that we do have and take stock. I mean, the intention behind the movie is to show how there are no easy answers or solutions. There's no hero's journey. There's no moral lesson. It's really more of a reflection on where we're at as a society. So, in that way, I always viewed the film as a cautionary tale. So, if there is a message, it's a warning about where our world could go and hopefully that in and of itself could provoke conversation.

Sadie: Yeah, I would hope so too. And I think that eerie thing is that this could actually happen. And that's scary.

Sam: Yeah, agreed.

Sadie: But I guess at the end of the day, we got Friends, and we can just watch that, and all is good. [laughs]

Sam: [laughs] Which is why physical media is so important! [laughs]

Leave the World Behind will release on Netflix on December 8, 2023