Soderbergh hears call to make ‘Unsane’

MOVIES

BERLIN — Steven Soderbergh’s horror debut “Unsane” had its Berlin Film Festival world premiere Wednesday night, making it the first movie filmed on an iPhone to compete for the Golden Bear, the festival’s top prize.

Soderbergh secretly shot the film in two weeks in London with Claire Foy (Queen Elizabeth II in Netflix’s “The Crown”) as Sawyer Valentini, a woman involuntarily committed to a mental institution.

Soderbergh traditionally directs and also serves as cinematographer on his films, under the pseudonym Peter Andrews.

Asked about Andrews, tongue firmly in cheek, he revealed, “He’s a bit of a drunk. Cheap and fast — and doesn’t talk much. So we’ll continue the collaboration.”

Although “Unsane” is touted as his first horror picture, the prolific filmmaker said, “I considered ‘Contagion’ (his 2011 drama about a global virus) a horror film. At least that’s the way I talked about it.

“But you have to be careful how you frame it. We’re trying to make clear this is a psychological, characterdriven piece.”

One with plenty of shocks and gore.

Foy’s Sawyer, it turns out, has fled Boston for Pennsylvania to escape a stalker. That stress prompts her to seek therapeutic help, which is how she finds herself locked up as a mental case.

Among the film’s many surprises, the most unexpected is Matt Damon’s uncredited appearance.

“I was talking to Matt on the phone, not the one I shot the movie with,” Soderbergh joked. “Matt asked what was coming. I said we’re about to go shoot this film and he said, ‘I would really like to see that in action.’”

Damon ended up in White Plains, N.Y., a week before “Unsane” actually began production overseas, to play a security expert Sawyer consulted.

“It’s so unsettling,” Soderbergh said. “A twopage monologue of how Sawyer’s life will never be the same from this day forward. It took an hour and a half to shoot him. Then I had the scene cut together when I had Claire.

“I think he’s got my record now — seven films we’ve done. We’re just going to keep going.”

CRAZY IDEA: Director Steven Soderbergh, left, filmed ‘Unsane’ using an iPhone. The horror film stars Claire Foy (above left with Jay Pharoah) as a young woman committed to a mental institution.