After a lighthearted, feel-good run of superhero movies in the last couple of years, the DC Universe returns to the dark and gritty with Clayface. At its helm is director James Watkins, whose body of work is marked by thrillers and horror flicks like The Woman in Black, Speak No Evil, and the 2016 Black Mirror episode “Shut Up and Dance.”
The story, written by horror media connoisseur Mike Flanagan, follows Matt Hagen (Tom Rhys Harries) as he turns to Dr. Caitlyn Corr (Naomi Ackie) for an experimental treatment that would restore his features after a mob boss disfigured him. The treatment works, but its physical and psychological effects eventually turn him into the titular Batman villain.
Over the past few years, we’ve seen body horror used as a response to or amplification of society’s anxieties about beauty, tech, and their intersections. Think Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance, Natalie Erika James’ Saccharine, or even Shell, a 2024 film directed by Max Minghella (who plays Gotham City police detective John Borelli).
And while it’s difficult to place Clayface in this emerging canon — being a comic book movie — Watkins at least agrees that his film speaks to our biggest fears du jour.
“What’s interesting about body horror is it speaks to a very primal anxiety, which is our lack of control over our bodies, or our bodies betraying us,” he says. “[Clayface] also speaks to a very current fear, in terms of science, AI, medicine, anything like that.”
Speaking to reporters in a junket, Watkins points to various other horror films as inspiration, such as John Carpenter’s The Thing, Shinya Tsukamoto’s Tetsuo: The Iron Man, John Landis’ American Werewolf in London, and David Cronenberg’s The Fly. With these being released in the decades before sophisticated CGI became a huge part of action filmmaking, the director says he prefers prosthetics over transforming Matt Hagen in post-production.
“I like how an audience feels it,” he tells Rolling Stone Philippines. “I like how actors respond to it, how it changes Tom’s mood, how it changes the mood of people who are interacting with him. It gives them something much more, rather than just saying, ‘We’ll do this in post,’ where it becomes vague and no one really knows what they’re reacting to.”
Rhys Harries adds, “The benefit of having prosthetics, especially when it’s on top of me, is that it will lead [me and] tell me what it wants to do.”
‘An Extremely Human Story’
The actor has a compassion for Matt that comes through when he talks about the character. When asked what excited him the most about playing the villain, Rhys Harries says, “[What excites me is] the journey that Matt goes on trying to retain a sense of himself throughout all the things that are thrown at him. I just really admire Matt’s self-preservation.”
Ackie feels similarly about playing Caitlin Corr, who she says has the “vibe of a mad scientist.”
“There’s an element of Dr. Frankenstein, there are elements of The Fly,” she says. “And [Clayface] also exists on its own as something where you really understand the reason why [the characters] are doing [what they’re doing]. It is an extremely human story.”
Minghella, meanwhile, praised the film for putting the complicated relationships (and love triangle) between Matt, Caitlin, and John at its center. “The fact that they made it like such a kind of complicated dynamic and absorbed all of those risks, [that] was indicative of the ambition of the project as a whole, which was to try and make something a bit more grown up and less obvious,” he says.
Both Ackie and Minghella also said production for Clayface felt “too fast,” but only because they had so much fun on set. “James creates the dream environment for an actor, where you get to really explore ideas and try stuff,” says Minghella. “And yet there’s a clear kind of guiding force. And I think we had an amazing time making this.”
“I wanted to revel in it a bit longer,” says Ackie. “I love DC, I also love horror, and I’ve had so much fun working on horror films. So, my [expectation] was [that] it was going to be really fun, and then it just surpassed that.”
Clayface is in Philippine cinemas starting October 21.
Frequently Asked Questions
Clayface is directed by James Watkins, with a story written by Mike Flanagan.
In Clayface, rising actor Matt Hagen loses job opportunities after a mob boss disfigures his face. Desperate to get his career back, he goes to Dr. Caitlyn Corr, who gives him an experimental treatment for his scars. But its physical and psychological side effects soon begin to wreak havoc on Matt.
Tom Rhys Harries stars as the titular character of Clayface, while Naomi Ackie and Max Minghella play Dr. Caitlyn Corr and detective John Borelli, respectively.
Clayface was released in Philippine cinemas on October 21, while its release in the U.S. is slated for October 23.
DCU CEO James Gunn has confirmed that a Batman movie is in the works, though it remains in early development. With Clayface being an origin story, the film may be setting the villain up to be one of Batman’s first enemies in the DCU.
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