James McAvoy explains his character’s haunting last line in ‘Speak No Evil’

James McAvoy’s latest film puts an American spin on a Danish horror of the same name. But the actor didn’t watch the original until “the day after we finished filming,” he says.

In fact, he tells TODAY.com in an interview, if he had seen it, he “probably wouldn’t have accepted the role.”

“Speak No Evil” again sees McAvoy step into the role of horror villain.

First known for playing romantic leads, like Robbie in “Atonement,” a superhero, with his eight-year stint as Charles Xavier in the “X-Men” franchise, and, of course, Mr. Tumnus in “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” — he turned to horror with M. Night Shyamalan’s “Split” and “Glass.” (As for what genre he’s interested in next? “It’s been a while since I’ve done comedy,” he says.)

In “Speak No Evil,” McAvoy plays a brazen but charming family man named Paddy who invites a couple he meets on vacation to his family’s home in rural England. They accept, and it turns into a visit from hell.

McAvoy says it isn’t the idea of ​​playing the villain that appeals to him as an actor, it’s the complexities behind the character.

“If it was just a straight up villain, I don’t think I’d find it that interesting,” he says.

Paddy specifically is “weirdly charming and entertaining and funny” — in addition to being “despicable and malevolent and brutish and toxically masculine,” McAvoy says.

“That’s a lot to do in one scene, sometimes — sometimes in one line,” he says. “And so as an actor, it’s a challenge, and it was hard work. But it was really fun, hard work.”

What is ‘Speak No Evil’ about?

The film opens with Paddy and his wife, Kira (Aisling Franciosi), on vacation in Italy with their son, Ant (Dan Hough).

There, they met an American family who recently moved to London — Louise (Mackenzie Davis), Ben (Scoot McNairy) and daughter Agnes (Alix West Lefler).

After a few polite run-ins and casual dinners, Paddy invites them to his estate.

A few weeks later, facing professional disappointments and struggling with the move, they head out into the country.

From the beginning, something is off. Awkward conversational tension builds to uncomfortable situations until “something” takes shape in the film’s final act. (We’ll save spoilers for later.)

McAvoy describes his character with a quote from his own grandfather: “Make sure to take full enjoyment.”

“I think that’s one of Paddy’s maxims that he keeps to himself,” McAvoy says. “I think I actually did put that in the movie at one point but it never made it to the final cut. Take full enjoyment — and ‘take’ being a big thing.”

Both the 2024 Blumhouse production and the original 2022 Danish version of “Speak No Evil” open with the same premise.

McAvoy says he realized the film was a remake after reading the script.

“So I thought, ‘Well, of course, I’ll check out the trailer or something.’ And I started watching the trailer, and within about 30 seconds, I turned it off and was like, ‘I shouldn’t watch this,'” McAvoy says.

“I just think if I’d have been unfortunate enough to see the original film — not that it’s unfortunate if you’ve seen the film,” he clarifies with a laugh. “It would have been unfortunate because I probably wouldn’t have accepted the role.”

He describes the 2024 production and 2022 Danish film as “slightly different films, slightly similar films.”

“I would have felt slightly trapped, I think, as an actor, because some of the time I make the same choices as the other film,” he says. “Some of the time I don’t make the same choices as the other film, but I was free to do my version of it.”

The stories also end in very different places.

How does ‘Speak No Evil’ end?

🚨🚨Warning: Spoilers for the 2022 and 2024 “Speak No Evil” films ahead.

In McAvoy’s version of “Speak No Evil,” the first two-thirds of the film are a slow building of tension. From the bat, Ben and Louise are visibly uncomfortable after Paddy makes Louise, a known vegetarian, try a piece of meat. The family almost leaves at one point after finding Agnes sleeping in Paddy and Kira’s bed, but they are persuaded to stay.

They later witness Paddy being rough with Ant, who can’t speak, sparking an awkward conversation about the social mores of criticizing other people’s parenting.

It all comes to a head when Ant shows Agnes the truth. In a shed on the estate, Ant points out a series of pictures that show that Paddy and Kira often meet families on vacation. In each picture, they seem to pose with a different child.

Turns out their MO is to take the child of each couple, cut out their tongue and pass the kid off as their own in front of the next family they meet. That means Ant is not their son, and Agnes is their next target.

Agnes tells her parents, and their attempts to leave the property are repeatedly foiled. Paddy ties them up and has Louise transfer all of the family’s money to his account. He threatens to kill Ant, Louise and Ben and prepares an anesthetic for Agnes, presumably so they can remove her tongue. When Louise asks why they are doing this, Paddy says, “Because you let us.”

That line, plus the film’s title, helps establish the film’s central theme: “Silence through politeness,” McAvoy says.

“The Daltons, they represent in society this social compliance and lack of action in the face of awful behavior. Whether that be personal, social, political, we stay silent. We don’t stand up. We don’t interject. We don ‘t even vote, sometimes.”

Louise, after hiding an X-Acto knife, finally fights back, starting a violent, gory game of cat-and-mouse through the country estate as her family and Ant try to survive Paddy and Kira’s attacks.

In the end, Louise’s family escapes out of an upstairs window and down a ladder. Kira finds them and is pushed off the roof to her death.

Paddy is eventually stopped by Agnes, who injects him with the anesthetic shot from earlier. But Ant won’t leave with Paddy alive. He approaches Paddy and picks up a rock. Before he repeatedly bashes in Paddy’s face, McAvoy’s character says, “That’s my boy.”

Paddy says that final line several times throughout the film, and it was originally a reference to a cartoon Ant watches.

“There’s a dog in, maybe ‘Tom & Jerry,’ that says ‘That’s my boy,'” McAvoy says, imitating a gruff, barking tone. “And so the director James (Watkins) wanted me literally trying to a little bad version of that voice.

“But then for some reason that cartoon didn’t make the film, and so I’m just doing this weird cartoon voice for no reason, and it was a bit weird,” he adds with a laugh.

The line marks Paddy’s last words.

“It’s like a parting shot from Paddy that he’s still trying to win with,” McAvoy says.

Earlier in the film, his character quotes a poem, Philip Larkin’s “This Be The Verse,” which reads, in part: “They f— you up, your mum and dad./ They may not mean to, but they do ./ They fill you with the faults they had/ And add some extra, just for you.”

“Paddy’s version of love, and how he learned to love, was through brutality,” McAvoy says. “And that was visited upon him by his father, and he’s taken it out on the rest of the world and taken it out on these children, too.”

The final scene of the film shows Louise, Ben and Agnes driving away from the estate in the car. Ant also sits in the backseat, hands bloodied, a single tear rolling down his cheek.

“I can’t really see a world in which Ant doesn’t have to do a hell of a lot of work on himself to not become somebody who’s very disturbed,” McAvoy says.

How does the 2022 version of ‘Speak No Evil’ end?

The original “Speak No Evil” — somehow — ends on an even darker note.

The Danish film, which stars Morten Burian, Sidsel Siem Koch, Fedja van Huêt and Karina Smulders, ends with family Bjørn, Louise and Agnes escaping after Bjørn finds the body of Patrick and Karin’s (adapted in 2024 to Paddy and Kira) “son, “Abel.

Bjørn’s car breaks down and Patrick and Karin find them. They cut out Agnes’ tongue, stone Bjørn and Louise to death and go on to target a new family.

This article was originally published on TODAY.com