Netflix’s New Sci-Fi Thriller Officially Gets a Sequel Update From Wagner Moura

Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for ‘The Last House’

Coming off his Oscar nomination for The Secret Agent, actor Wagner Moura took some time to promote his upcoming Netflix thriller, The Last House, from director Louis Leterrier (The Incredible Hulk, Fast X). Moura’s well known for his heart-pounding work in action and drama like Narcos, The Gray Man, and Civil War, but in a conversation with Collider’s Steven Weintraub, he admits this single-location mystery gave him a run for his money.

Now streaming on Netflix, The Last House is a sci-fi slow burn about a family of four trapped in their home as a mysterious threat waits outside. Moura plays opposite Past Lives standout Greta Lee, and Gabriel Barbosa (May December), Emma Ho (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds), Noah Alexander Sosnowski (Section 8) and Riley Chung (The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes).

In this interview, which you can watch in the video above, with a transcript below, Moura discusses why The Last House was an unexpectedly demanding shoot, and reveals his thoughts on the ending and who really survives. He also teases one of his many upcoming projects, working alongside Kristen Stewart (Love Lies Bleeding) in Panos Cosmatos’s (Mandy) next horror, Flesh of the Gods.

Wagner Moura on the Challenges of Filming in One Location

“This was the most physically demanding thing I have ever done before.”

COLLIDER: After watching the movie, I realized I do not have enough water and food in my place. I’m just curious if after making this you had an epiphany of, like, “I need to keep more shit at my house?”

WAGNER MOURA: No. You know what? The kind of epiphany that I had was kind of the opposite. I think that I thought, “I don’t need half of the things that I have in my house.” We have too many things. I love the fact that these characters, especially Greta [Lee]’s character, recycles things. I think that we have too much stuff. We have to get rid of it and give it to people that need it. I think that we have too many things.

I always remember the line from David Fincher’s Fight Club: “The things you own end up owning you.”

MOURA: Exactly. That’s right.

One of the things that’s really interesting about the film is that it takes place in one location, but this had to have been a challenging shoot because of how much stuff you go through when you’re working with kid actors. Where does this rank in your filmography in terms of difficulty making of it?

MOURA: Dude, believe it or not, I think this was the most physically demanding thing I have ever done before, and I’ve done films like Elite Squad or Narcos, or even Civil War. This was unexpectedly hard. When I read the script, it’s a film with four actors in a house, and we were shooting in a soundstage, and then we’ll have our trailers outside. [Laughs] It was very, very physically demanding. Either that or I’m getting old, or maybe both.

Especially the part in the water. We shot the film chronologically, and so the water was the last part of it. Like, it was the last two or three weeks. Oh man, that was challenging. That was very challenging, demanding. Very physically challenging.

When I saw the water, that’s when I realized I can’t be an actor. I can’t be any part of this.

MOURA: Bro. Yeah, man. And again, I read the script, like, “Oh, this can be fun,” but it was very, very hard. We had to hold our breath in the water and spend the entire day in the water, with the water, like, here, and our skin… Oh, it was hard. It was very difficult.

Again, that’s not for me. Do you think the family are the only survivors, or do you think other people survived this?

MOURA: I think there are other people that survived, as well, and that’s interesting. I mean, I hope the film does well and then we can have a sequel to that, either with our characters or not. I’m very curious to know how the world is after they get out of the house. And the creatures, I would love to know more about those creatures, and how the world is now.

I do like that Louis [Leterrier] did not try to explain everything. It’s just what the characters could see is what they understood.

MOURA: Yes. That’s right.

Wagner Moura Teases Working With Kristen Stewart in ‘Flesh of the Gods’

The upcoming film comes from ‘Mandy’ director Panos Cosmatos.

Before I run out of time, I’m really looking forward to Flesh of the Gods. For people that don’t realize who this filmmaker is, what can you tease people about it, and how does it compare to Mandy?

MOURA: Dude, Panos [Cosmatos] is one of the most unique artists I have ever met in my life. He has a very particular aesthetic. I had never seen anything like Mandy before. And then, this film has such a great script. Also, Kristen Stewart, she herself is a major creative force in the film. I was very, very happy with everything we did there.

The Last House is available to stream on Netflix now.