The Surrender‘s stars Colby Minifie and Kate Burton, alongside writer/director Julia Max, were dedicated to exploring something very human in the supernaturally-tinted horror drama. The film focuses on Megan and Barbara as they reckon with the failing health of the family patriarch. While Megan is grieving, she becomes shaken by the discovery of how far into the supernatural space Barbara has been increasingly looking into, and the lengths she’ll go to bring her husband back from the ᴅᴇᴀᴅ in one of 2025’s most haunting summer releases.

Described by the stars as a personal character drama that gradually morphs into a haunting horror, The Surrender benefits greatly from those two central performances. During an interview with Screen Rant, Julia Max, Colby Minifie, and Kat Burton discussed finding grounded humanity amid the more supernatural scares, the benefits of approaching the script more like a play than a film, and the lengths the stars went to portray their grieving mother and daughter dynamic.

The Back And Forth Of The Surrender

“This Entire Production Was… An Amazing Experience”

The Surrender is very much a two-hander, relying on the chemistry between the lead actresses who play the grieving daughter and mother, Megan and Barbara. Luckily for filmmaker Julia Max, she recruited Colby Minifie and Kate Burton for the project, who quickly found a creative rapport that benefited the show. “We were immediately linked,” Minifie explained. “We were endlessly talking, chatting, constantly hanging out in each other’s dressing rooms. Thankfully, Kate allowed me to sit in her dressing room and just chit-chat for hours.”

“I think that was very gracious of Kate, but it was also essential to the building of this relationship because Megan and Barbara are at each other’s throats so much in this movie. But underneath it, there needed to be that familial love built in.” Minifie was also very keen to discuss the impact Julia’s approach had on the film, noting that she “wrote a really amazing script that feels very much like a play. Kate and I come from theater, so for us to have a week of rehearsal like this was incredibly amazing. A huge gift.“

Kate Burton still recalls meeting with Julia and her reps to discuss the film, and her first question was who had been cast to play Megan. After learning it would be Colby in that role, Burton grew increasingly excited for the project. “Colby is absolutely right,” Burton explained, noting how the space created by Julia and the other filmmakers on set led to “an unbelievably collaborative space. We rehearsed for a week, and it was honestly like breathing for us.“

“By the time we started shooting, we’d rehearsed and played with the script, and Julia allowed us to make some suggestions, which she was so unbelievably gracious in taking them. I know it sounds trite, but we became an incredible team from day one, and by the time we were shooting we were already so in it. Colby and I have done a lot of shows over the years, we’ve seen things come and we’ve seen things go. This entire production was just sort of this amazing experience, because we don’t get this very often.”

“It’s two leading ladies, and we got to create the story. What I love about the script, and I told Julia this from day one, was that it starts out as a domestic drama about a mother and daughter dealing with this classic thing that mothers and daughters might have to deal with in the death of a father. Then it turns into a horror movie! I’ve done a lot of domestic dramas, but I haven’t done a lot of horror movies. I was used to the first part, and the second was exciting.”

Julia Max’s Approach To The Surrender As Her First Feature-Length Film

“[The Surrender] Lives Or Dies By The Actors.”

The Surrender is the feature-length debut for filmmaker Julia Max, who wrote and directed the film. It’s an ambitious project for the director, whose previous work was largely short films. The movie remains almost entirely focused on the relationship between Mary and Barbara, even as the lines of reality begin to blur. “Because it’s my first feature, I feel like you’ve got to just swing for the hills,” Max explained.

“I got incredibly lucky getting to work with Kate and Colby. Without them, this film would not have worked at all. We knew from the beginning that this film was very execution dependent. It lives or dies by the actors. As soon as we got them on board, we knew the hard part was done.” The film approaches more than just one type of horror, too, with the plot about a grieving mother and daughter employing creepy atmosphere, jump scares, and even some perfectly deployed gore for great effect.

Reflecting on finding the right balance for all those different types of scary to come together to form a cohesive whole, Max noted that “I think the grounded element is so important. Without it, I don’t think the horror works. We were very aware that we had to, especially with the first act, to sell this as reality. All of us will go through at some point in our lives. It’s something a lot of us have dealt with before, in order to really live in the real world.

“The wonderful thing about Colby and Kate is that they are so fully committed at every step of the process. You need that so desperately because if they don’t commit to it, then once things start going off the rails, it can feel silly. Because [Colby and Kate] committed so much, you feel like these are real people who are really experiencing everything happening to them. I’m just so in awe of both of them.”

Finding Humanity In Horror In The Surrender

“Especially If You’re Working On Something Like The Boys Or The Walking ᴅᴇᴀᴅ, You Get Used To Having To Ground Really Wild Situations…”

The Surrender is the latest horror film to explore heavy, realistic themes from a frightening place. Playing with different genres and finding the grounded humanity amid the chaos isn’t new ground for either Milifie or Burton, however. Despite their many dramatic performances, both of them have also appeared in bombastic shows that push the line of reality, like Burton’s cult-classic performance in Big Trouble in Little China or Milifie’s terrific work in The Boys.

When asked if their approach to character work is ever impacted by the genre or the world surrounding their characters, Milifie admitted that “I know this sounds wild, but there’s no real difference for me. I grew up playing dress up with my sister, and then I got to make a job out of that.” Leaning into that natural sense of play and discovery is vital to Milifie’s approach to character work, regardless of the tone of the genre she’s inhabiting.

“My favorite thing to do is to put myself in imaginary circumstances and play in a safe space with people who are down to play. That’s what [The Surrender] was like to me. Especially if you’re working on something like The Boys or The Walking ᴅᴇᴀᴅ, you get used to having to ground really wild situations, thinking ‘Okay, what is the reality of this? If I were in this situation, how would I behave?’ It feels like a joy, and it doesn’t really change my approach.”

Speaking of The Boys, which is approaching its fifth and final season, Milifie was quick to compliment the creatives on that show and revealed that “I just read the finale last night. It’s an extremely satisfying finale. That’s what I will say. It’s extremely satisfying. I was getting emotional reading it.” Comparing her work on the superhero satire to films like The Surrender, Milifie reiterated that “the only way that those things work, as we’ve been talking about, is if they are grounded.

“If we believe that it’s all grounded in reality and in something that the audience can connect to, it works. Oh yeah. I have a crazy boss, and it makes me want to rip my hair out, you know? [In The Surrender], I’m having trouble with my mom. Our dad died, and Mom wants to bring him back. The grief is real, and the world can expand from there.” Burton had a similar perspective, noting that “all of us actors, we sort of look at everything and wonder what are the different genres” as they take on roles.

“I’ve been doing this for many decades. The reality is, my area of expertise has seemed to take root. I’ve always been the queen of hour-long television drama. I’ve gotten to play with other genres though. I got into sci-fi a little bit, I did a few shows up in Vancouver, I did Charmed and Supergirl. My first movie was Big Trouble in Little China! Little did I know that while doing that movie, it would be such a cult classic 40 years later.

“The way you approach it, like Colby says, is that you jump into a story and a character and plot, and then you realize what that genre is… It’s just a joyful thing to be making this wonderful story that Julia created. I’ve worked with some first-time feature directors, but Julia… the meticulous work that went into it.

This is a big movie, and we sH๏τ it in 18 days. I’ve been on movies that sH๏τ over eight weeks that are not as big as this one. It’s always so exciting to me when we can tell a story and do it in such a slender way that you cut right to it. There’s no messing around. I found that exhilarating to work on.”