Meet Writer/Director Emily Greenwood:
To start, please introduce yourself:
I’m Emily Greenwood, a writer/director based in Kent, just outside London, UK. I’ve always been drawn to dark stories and characters with a bit of an edge—twisted, conflicted, complex. I also love high production values and strong cinematic appeal. My 6th and most recent short, Stop Dead, is a proof of concept for my horror feature debut, The Still Man, with Shadowhouse Films (Host, Dashcam) and Lunar Lander Films (The Severed Sun). Stop Dead is near the end of an amazing festival run, racking up over 65 official selections across 23 countries and winning four awards. With a background in mostly drama and suspense, I love weaving those elements into horror, bringing flesh and body to subconscious fears.
Horror, to me, is the unease that comes from the distortion of the ordinary. It’s when something familiar becomes corrupted or invaded by something unnatural, leaving you with that uncomfortable feeling that something is off. Comfortable becomes uncomfortable. Safe becomes sinister. It’s the tension between what seems normal and the creeping dread lurking beneath the surface. While jump scares and gore can be fun, there needs to be a deeper, unsettling atmosphere to ground them.
Horror, like any good storytelling, needs strong characters with relatable problems. When their ordinary lives are thrust into something terrifying, that’s when the pressure really builds. If we connect with characters and understand their struggles, the horror becomes more personal. Their fear becomes our fear, and the situation they find themselves in becomes all the more real and scary.
Everything I made early on was experimental and a bit strange, but as I gained more experience and budgets grew, I became more aware of audience. I didn’t want to make films just for myself. Of course, I still want to tell the stories I’m passionate about, but a film isn’t truly alive without people to watch it.
This led me to create more mainstream films, but still exploring the darker aspects of human nature. My fourth short, Cold Warrior, for example, is more of a political thriller than a horror film, but its story of abortion doping in gymnastics is undeniably horrific and harrowing.
Interestingly, it was during my maternity leave that I found myself gravitating more toward horror! During that time my agent sent me scripts and introduced me to David Scullion, the writer of Stop Dead and my debut feature, The Still Man, which I later co-wrote with him.
Inspiration is everywhere — life, the news, films, books. But of course it always seems to come at the most inconvenient moments: just as I’m about to fall asleep, out walking, exercising, in my dreams. Never when I’m actually trying to think of something! You can’t force it. And if I don’t write an idea down immediately, it’s gone forever. It’s a bit overwhelming at times, when you have multiple ideas fighting for attention. But the real challenge is having the discipline to focus on just one.
I don’t think about legacy or how I’ll be remembered. I just want to create stories that are meaningful to me at the moment, that hopefully resonate with others too. I want to create films that challenge, provoke, and entertain, and if they’re inspiring or leave a lasting impression on viewers, that’s a wonderful outcome. But ultimately, I just want to make great films that people appreciate, and enjoy the experience of making them.
Take Coralie Fargeat, for example – why did it take until mid-life for such a talented director to finally break out? How many other visionary women are out there, struggling to get their films made? We are still massively underrepresented in film, especially in high-budget and mainstream genre projects. But when films like The Substance smash it, it just proves what we already know, that female genre directors can absolutely succeed in a huge way. Horror is a powerful, commercially viable genre, so why aren’t more women getting the chance to make their mark?
We all know the barriers that have held women back in film for so long. It’s never been about talent, it’s about access and opportunity. But what’s actually being done about it? Initiatives like WiHM are amazing for keeping the momentum going and championing female horror filmmakers, but we also need the big players—the studios, the streamers, the funding bodies—to step up. The industry thrives on fresh perspectives. Opportunity should be about talent, not outdated biases. Every filmmaker, no matter their gender, background, or ethnicity, should have a fair shot at building their career and shaping the future of horror and film as a whole.
Karyn Kusama — Jennifer’s Body, The Invitation, Destroyer, and Yellowjackets. I enjoy the psychological depth and the blend of horror and thriller elements in Kusama’s work.
Kathryn Bigelow — not technically a horror director, but definitely worth mentioning, being one of the few women to break into big-budget genre filmmaking with films like Point Break, The Hurt Locker, and Near Dark.
Coralie Fargeat – I’ve been following her since Revenge, which really impressed me. I’m not a huge body horror fan, but The Substance has been incredible for raising female voices in horror. Also, her journey, breaking out in mid-life after many years of persistence, is so inspiring and brings hope to so many of us.
When it comes to actors, Mia Goth blew me away in Ti West’s trilogy, especially Pearl, where she managed to balance heartbreaking vulnerability with an intensity that was genuinely unsettling. That final shot, that desperation in her eyes, had me in tears! Maika Monroe has a quiet resilience and an effortless screen presence that makes everything she does feel so natural and grounded. Then there’s Toni Collette, who is just on another level! Her emotional range is unreal. One of the most raw and expressive actors out there.
Beyond filmmaking, I really admire Mònica García Massagué, Director of the Sitges Film Festival Foundation. She’s created valuable opportunities for women in horror, launching Woman In Fan at Sitges in 2018 and curating the new Horror Girls events for the 2024 festival.
I’d also like to mention Heidi Honeycutt, founder of the Etheria Film Festival and author of I Spit on Your Celluloid: The History of Women Directing Horror Movies. Her work championing female genre filmmakers is invaluable, and her book is a must-read for anyone interested in women’s contributions to horror.
The Still Man is about a workaholic city detective who must stop a ruthless serial killer, but discovers her perpetrator is a terrifying, supernatural entity with a horrifying ultimatum: if you stop moving, you die.
At its heart, this is a story about the fear of stopping — about a woman whose job overshadows her relationship with her own daughter. As someone with a demanding career and a family of my own, the workaholic theme feels deeply personal. Developing this film has been a powerful reminder of how important it is to slow down, close the laptop, put down the phone and spend time with loved ones, especially children, because they’re not going to be kids forever.
I am also writing an action thriller script called Griefer about a bored stay-at-home father who amuses himself by harassing online gamers, but unwittingly provokes the rage of another player who wants revenge in the real world. I started Griefer some time ago, but it kept getting set aside as other projects took precedence. Now, I’m determined to stay focused and see it through and resist the temptation to let it slip down the priority list again.
I also have the feature length script of Cold Warrior that I wrote some time ago. I haven’t put it out there much yet, as it’s an ambitious script and I was a lot less experienced when I wrote it. But it’s a passion project, and I’m confident its time will come when I’m ready.
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(Photo 01 courtesy of Willie Runte – Emily directing Stop Dead)
(Photo 02 Courtesy of Ralph Barklam – Emily directing actor Eloise Littell in Cold Warrior.)
(Photo 03 courtesy of Willie Runte – Emily directing Stop Dead)
(Photo 04 courtesy of Willie Runte – Emily directing actor James Swanton playing The Still Man in Stop Dead)