The Infernal Machine writer and director Andrew Hunt describes what inspired his psychological thriller, working with Guy Pearce, and much more.

Writer and director Andrew Hunt's The Infernal Machine stars Guy Pearce, Alex Pettyfer, Alice Eve, and Jeremy Davies in a gripping psychological narrative. Pearce's character, Bruce Cogburn, is an author who wrote a book titled "The Infernal Machine," which inspired Dwight Tufford (Pettyfer) to commit a mass shooting.

In his remote home in the California desert, Bruce begins receiving mysterious letters from a fan named William Dukent. The film's mystery entwines Bruce, Dwight, police officer Higgins (Eve), and an old student of Bruce's named Elijah Barett (Davies). The Infernal Machine is Hunt's first feature-length film as a director.

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Screen Rant spoke with Hunt about The Infernal Machine, including his inspiration for writing the film, the complexity of Bruce Cogburn, and what it was like working with Pearce.

Screen Rant: What was your inspiration for The Infernal Machine?

Andrew Hunt: It started with me listening to a podcast called The Hilly Earth Society, which is created and produced by a podcast series called The Truth. It's an anthology series. The entire episode was just a bunch of voicemails. A reclusive author is leaving messages for a fan that somehow got his address, but the podcast didn't give any information as to who the writer is, what he had written, things to that degree. It caused me as a writer to get really excited because I thought I could really flesh out this world.

The other inspiration I have is — one of my favorite thematics is creation, and Frankenstein is like the greatest story ever written in my mind. I really wanted to play off of that. So, when you're thinking of reclusive authors, you tend to think of J.D. Salinger, you think of the book that he wrote, Catcher in the Rye, and the mythology behind Catcher in the Rye. This is a book that somewhat inspired the assassination of John Lennon, the assassination attempt of Ronald Reagan, an actress named Rebecca Schaeffer in the late '80s. The mythology behind that book was really fascinating, so that gave me a lot of ideas of "What if we had this story of this reclusive author who had written this very controversial novel that caused a lot of violence to occur 25 years ago, and put him in the desert now, and that be our seed for this psychological thriller?"

"The Infernal Machine" is also the title of Bruce’s novel in the film. There’s a noticeable connection to religion and humans as machines, but in your eyes, how does the movie as a whole align with the theme of this book?

Andrew Hunt: I've always found it fascinating when people want to blame others for their own misgivings. There are two books in the film. There's The Infernal Machine and The Divine Apostate. I think The Infernal Machine is about that we blame others for our own misgivings, that we believe there is such a thing as predetermined destination as to what you're supposed to do — which I personally think is BS. I think you're your own person, and you make your own decisions, and you need to own them and be accountable for them. I think that is what the second book is actually about. That is how I've always viewed religion — it's take your own accountability, and you can't blame others. I think it's more about we, as human beings like to pretend and wear a lot of masks of who we are, who we think we are.

We see this in social media, like nobody takes pictures of the cereal they had for breakfast. Everyone's very interested in the beautiful, layed-out salad that they ordered for lunch, or that everyone likes to see their feet in the sand at the ocean and pretend to make their lives more interesting than they actually are. I think we're used to that kind of presentational standpoint to make it seem like our lives are a lot more interesting. With the film, you have a character who is basically playing that role and pretending to be what a great writer looks like. What does a great writer wear? What kind of vehicle to they drive? What kind of cigarettes to they smoke? What kind of music do they listen to? Even if it's not music that you like. It doesn't matter. It's like, "This is what brilliant people listen to, so I need to listen to it too."

As a writer, what was your strategy for depicting Bruce’s confusion and paranoia from receiving these letters while also foreshadowing the reveals toward the end of the film?

Andrew Hunt: It was funny because the first 85 pages of the script took me about eight weeks to write. When I figured out the big reveal of the film, that's when it became incredibly personal for me because I felt like I could go back to the original 85 pages and put in these ideas of not just every scene working plot-wise, but every scene working in regards to being honest and truthful with yourself. It was one of those things that as I write, usually it's the ninth thing I come up with which is what I use. Usually the first, second and third thing you've seen a million times in movies. I'm like, "OK, I can't use those because I've seen them a million times." If I can pick out a movie that I've seen this in, then I can't use it. That was kind of great because you're using the whole film history of every psychological thriller that's been made before you, and you're going, "I can't do that, I can't do that, and I can't do that because it's been done here, here, here, and here," and you need to create something new and fresh because I feel that this genre, in particular, has been resting too much on the films that were made 20 years ago and that we need to inject it with some new approaches, some new twists, some new turns.

Clearly, we know the audience has evolved. Fight Club, Memento, Seven — when those movies first came out, they were just groundbreaking because we had never seen stories told that way before. Then, over the next 15-20 years, we've just been rehashing those same giant twists and turns where the audience is like, "Man, I'm done with that. I saw that 20 years ago. Give me something new. Give me something different." So as a filmmaker, time is the most important commodity that anyone ever has, and if an audience is giving me two hours of theirs, I need to respect and honor that, and create the coolest two hours that they have. That's why any time that we would design the film in a way that we felt could go down this angle that would be more in the world of cliché, we would literally take that, tear it up, burn it, bury the ashes to make sure that none of the residence of that comes into the world.

I’m also curious about your approach to incorporating flashbacks. How did you go about including these scenes while maintaining a sense of mystery surrounding each character?

Andrew Hunt: We almost looked at the moment, Elijah's self emulation, is that Bruce is suffering from PTSD. This is a reoccurring thing, and I think the reason that the flashbacks become stronger and more prevalent throughout the film is the fact that this Dukent, this person that's writing him these letters is opening up Pandora's box. This has been memories that Bruce has had boxed up and buried for maybe 15-20 years. All of a sudden, these letters that start showing up are now opening up that box and having him relive that trauma and that past. It's causing him to want to grab the bottle again and start to drink again. So, you're trying to decide in a way that you let the flashbacks not so much reveal plot, but reveal where Bruce was emotionally.

The scene where I think the flashbacks really give the audience an insight into who this guy once was is when he's sitting in front of his typewriter, and we're seeing this curmudgeon, bearded, half sober, half drunk Bruce Cogburn, and we're flashing back to this clean-cut professor Cogburn who's lecturing in a college. It's like a completely different person. I've always found that it's always the in-betweens that I find more interesting, where it's like, "What made this sweet, great teacher turn into this bitter, paranoid writer?" and there's got to be something in between. I know that as an audience member, I'm hoping the filmmaker is going to honor that and give me that information, but he or she is going to make me wait for it because usually it's that reveal, that kernel which is what plants the change in the character and where the character goes from this uplifting, positive citizen of society to this very inwardly egotistical, broken man.

Do you imagine Bruce to be more of a hero or villain in this story? Does he redeem himself by the end?

Andrew Hunt: When Guy and I talked a lot about Bruce Cogburn, the one character that we talked a lot about in reality was Lance Armstrong — someone who built their entire dynasty on lies and on cheating. When you hear the history about every year the paranoia, and the demands, and the craziness got greater and greater with that bicyclist, and how he was trying to keep that secret contained, you could totally see how that's got to slowly be destroying you. It's like a cancer on the inside. I look at the movie as a positive ending. Some other people who have watched it have told me that it's different. The great thing is that the way that the film ends allows the audience to make that judgment.

I tend to like to make films where the audience gets to participate in the film. I'm probably one of the only guys on the planet that actually rooted for the teacher in Whiplash. At the end of Whiplash, it's a great ending for both of them. They both found what they were looking for. I look at the character of Bruce Cogburn as the next 20 years of his life is going to be probably absolute hell, but I think he's going to be free. I think at the end of the day, that's more important.

What was it like working with Guy Pearce? Was there anything about his portrayal of Bruce that surprised or impressed you?

Andrew Hunt: Everything impressed me. The film gods, the clouds opened up, and said, "You may have Guy Pearce in your movie." It was an absolute honor to work with him because I grew up on Guy's movies: The Proposition, Memento, L.A. Confidential, you name it. I'm a huge fan. To see him then take something that I have written, you're sitting there watching this amazing actor play a character that you wrote and then go so far beyond what you thought that character was. Every little intricate detail, you're going, "Oh, I didn't know that." I remember the second day of shooting, we were doing the scene in front of the café where Bruce is supposed to meet Dukent for the first time. There were these little things that Guy did that I just started laughing behind the monitor. I remember in between setups, I'd walk over to guy and sometimes sit next to him and be silent for 15 seconds to figure out what profound thing I'm going to say — which most times it wasn't. I would sit there, finally I looked at him, and I'm like, "Man, I had no idea he was this funny," and Guy went, "Right, yeah." That was the one thing that really shocked me, just how comical this character was.

Granted we had picked out the wardrobe, so the scene of him coming out with a high-powered rifle in this ridiculous robe I always thought would be funny, but when Guy did it, there was so much intensity. It was one of those things that we just celebrated. Guy had this mantra that he would say, "Let's just be bold. If we're gonna do it, let's just do it. Instead of me wearing pajamas and a cowboy hat shooting bottles, how about I show up in my underwear?" It's those kinds of things that really got me excited as a director when you see your lead actor — basically your partner and collaborator in this film — go, "Let's see how far we can take this Cogburn guy and see how far we can stretch him" to the point where it's incredibly entertaining for the audience. I've never seen Guy play a part like this, but at the same time, you could say that about every Guy Pearce movie. He never plays the same character. He's a chameleon. He can morph into all these different characters, and it's just so much fun to watch. For me, the best thing is I had a front row seat to watch this Bruce Cogburn character come to life through Guy, which was amazing.

You shot the entire movie in Portugal. What made this the right location for the deserted area where Bruce lives?

Andrew Hunt: At the end of the day, it was money. My producer, Lionel Hicks, said that Moviebox down in Portugal would be willing to work with us to make the movie. The first thing I had to do — this was during COVID — was put on a VR set of goggles and walk around Portugal and see that it matched Southern California. Once we found this one area that matches like 45 minutes southwest of the Mojave Desert, we're like, "OK, we're in." I think it was Calexico-Mexicali that we were trying to use as a reference for Portugal. I was absolutely honored, though, besides the locations. The crew was unreal. They're amazing.

We shot down there for five weeks, and it was just a magical experience. I've never worked with a crew that passionate and that hard-working ever. It was a tiny crew, too. Guy had just got off the movie Memory with Liam Neeson, and I knew that's probably a giant movie compared to our little film. But it was great. Everyone had a blast making the film. It was tough, but I think at the end of the day, I think we're really proud of what we made.

Bruce Cogburn, a reclusive and controversial author of the famed book "The Infernal Machine," is drawn out of hiding when he begins to receive endless letters from an obsessive fan. What ensues is a dangerous labyrinth as Bruce searches for the person behind the cryptic messages, forcing him to confront his past and ultimately reveal the truth behind the book.

Check out our other interview with The Infernal Machine stars Guy Pearce and Alex Pettyfer as well.

The Infernal Machine is now available on VOD.

Madeline Lapreziosa writes features and interviews talent for Screen Rant, covering TV and Movies. A 2022 graduate of Penn State University, she possesses dual bachelor's degrees in print/digital journalism and French. Madeline has extensively reported on both sports and entertainment in her writing career. Outside of her love for TV and films, Madeline enjoys reading and watching soccer. Her all-time favorite works of fiction are The Expanse, The Hunger Games, and Game of Thrones.