In your Venus I saw several elements that reminded me of Suspiria, Rosemary’s Baby, but also Lovecraft. Did you take inspiration from any of these?

I wasn’t inspired by any of them, really, at least not consciously. I have Argento’s films in my blood. I am a great admirer of his. I love Argento. And he has always been one of the great inspirations in my career. And, of course, also Rosemary’s Baby and to Lovecraft’s short story Dreams in the Witch House. There are many things that I carry within me as a viewer. That’s why, I think, they show up in the film, although it was not intentional. In fact, it is a very personal film. I talked a lot with Fernando Navarro, we were looking for an interesting story. We had started working on it, but I quickly realized it wasn’t working. So I started to tell this story that had been in my head for a long time. A girl from the Bajera neighborhood who steals drugs, runs away and ends up in a dangerous place. And I started to develop it. Fernando was always supportive and we worked on it together. But it’s a story that I had very clear from the beginning, for at least two years. It is a very personal story. The moment Alex de la Iglesia called me and said, “I want you to make a horror film,” I didn’t have anything in mind yet, then certain images came to my mind. Fernando helped me a lot and Alex gave me absolute creative freedom.

The first part of the film is characterized mostly by suspense and tension. In the second one you focused a lot, however, on splatter and bloody scenes. This is not your usual way of leadership.

Actually, I think they are not two very different parts. The first part grows and has different lines coming together. And when they converge they have an emotional power that allows them to explode. What I’ve always tried to do in my films is for the ending to be uphill. I’ve tried to do that. And in this one maybe even more so. But I like there to be lines that converge so that in the end everything goes upward. Venus begins as a social drama, then proceeds as a thriller, and gradually morphs until it explodes into something pure horror and fantasy. I like to think of the film as a chrysalis, representing realism, which gradually turns into a magnificent butterfly, representing the fantastic instead.

A crucial point in the story is the important presence of the female figure.

Contrary to what one might think after the first part of the film, the villain characters are women and not men, who are instead relegated to almost marginal roles. All the power of the story lies in the women. In the protagonist first and foremost, who is pure strength, a complex, atypical but powerful heroine, but also in her niece and the rest of the cast. In almost every film the killer is always the man, I liked to subvert this cliché. Even the supernatural presences are female.

Let’s talk about the three old ladies, who play precisely these supernatural figures. They are perfect.

I did a lot of casting and saw a lot of actresses. I usually work with casting director Cristina Campos. She has a clinical eye for actors. And she often proposes little-known actors to me. She is very good at finding wonderful actors who are not very well known to the public. Usually, when you’re casting, they always tell you to choose actors who are already very famous. The casting director I work with, however, is not like that. There are always incredible actors who then do wonderful roles. That was the case with Magüi Mira, the great witch. She is a diva of Spanish cinema and theater. But she is not a very famous person, but a great diva, a prestigious character. And we were looking for just that.

Ester Exposito plays the main character. How important was her performance?

She is a very good and intelligent actress, she has understood and studied the character, and she has fit perfectly into the role of the protagonist. More than 90% of the film is her. In fact, the title of the film refers not only to the building, the “Venus,” in which much of the film takes place, but to the protagonist, a “Venus” in the flesh.

Ester was always our first choice; we immediately thought of her. There were other options, but she was the one we felt was right for us.

The child, Ines Fernandez, is also incredible.

Wonderful, spontaneous, intelligent, involved in dramatic scenes. Very powerful scenes where she really cried. It is very difficult for a little girl to really cry. She, on the other hand had such an emotional involvement in the film that it allowed her to really cry. During the filming on the set there was a lot of blood. At one point she felt sick and almost fainted. We had to put her on the couch. Poor thing. And then she stayed like that, opened her eyes and said, “I’m better. We can continue.” And she went back to rolling again. Great.