‘Damsel’ Director Praises Millie Bobby Brown in Her Genre-Subverting Role

Despite the movie’s name, Millie Bobby Brown is no one’s damsel in the upcoming Netflix Original, Damsel. The film takes the age-old trope of a young woman in need of rescuing by a dashing young prince and turns it completely on its head, and that is where Brown shines.

Damsel follows the story of Elodie, a princess whose life ends up being more of a nightmare than the fairytale she was promised. After being sacrificed by her Prince to a dragon, Elodie doesn’t sit there and wait to be rescued, oh no—she sets out to rescue herself and take down the whole system while she’s at it.

Brown has already showcased her acting chops in the likes of Stranger Things as well as the Enola Holmes films, but the trailer for Damsel sees the actress pushing herself to the limit, literally—she pushes her body through the cracks in a cave in one scene. The film’s director, the Oscar-nominated Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, spoke to Total Film about just how phenomenal Brown was in the role.

Whilst discussing the physical aspects of performance, Fresnadillo states that Brown “was exceptional,” adding, “She understood that this needed to be an extreme survival experience. And in order to make that believable, you have to convey suffering and pain.” Whilst we have already seen Brown convey rage and emotional pain in the role of Eleven in Stranger Things, this role showcases the physical pain of her character, too.

The film doesn’t try to keep her clean and pretty throughout, as women are so often presented in action movies despite all they endure. She is battered, bruised, bloody, and tear-streaked as she hides from a fire-breathing dragon, squeezes through cracks in a cave, climbs a razor-sharp crystal shaft, and picks up a sword to defend herself.

She does all this to survive because her reality is not what she was led to believe it would be, and whilst none of us can say we have undergone this exact experience, it draws parallels to the female experience that Fresnadillo touches on.

“This is a movie about a transformation—about a girl becoming a woman—and you need to really feel the intensity of it. We didn’t want to cheat any of that, and that’s why we pushed all the limits to make this a huge roller coaster of an experience for the audience.”

For Brown to convey this, she had to be put through the gauntlet herself, as the film aims to convey the brutality of Elodie’s situation. This brought up challenges for filming, with Fresnadillo discussing shooting on location in Portugal, “The caves were a huge problem in terms of light, and in terms of design, because you’re dealing with an environment that’s really tight and dark.” He acknowledges that for Brown, though, this location was especially tough.

“It’s a much bigger challenge for Millie to go through almost half of the movie in such a difficult environment. You’re dealing with rocks, hard surfaces, cramped ceilings, fire, water, darkness … if you want to be realistic, which was the goal, you have to really believe it. And that kind of realism implies toughness.”

Brown is joined by some true Hollywood legends in Damsel, including Angela Bassett and Robin Wright. The latter plays the role of Queen Isabelle, a woman with power who, rather than using it to change things, only further enforces the role of women as sacrifices. It appears that she will face off against Bassett’s character, Lady Bayford.

This genre-bending film was originally set to arrive on Netflix in 2023 but will now be released on March 8, 2024.

(via Total Film, featured image: Netflix)