‘Immaculate’ jump scares: The latest from Spokane’s Sydney Sweeney has moviegoers jumping out of their seats

From staff reports

Fresh off hosting “Saturday Night Live,” Spokane’s Sydney Sweeney made her way to Austin for the South by Southwest Film and TV Festival, where her latest movie, “Immaculate,” premiered.

SXSW crowds at the Paramount Theatre screamed over the religious horror film. The film’s jump scares, Variety reported, had the crowd jumping out of their seats.

“I think that you really truly care about the characters and story,” Sweeney said onstage after the screening. “Yes, we wanted you guys all to jump in your seats and be hopefully horrified … But you still care about the story.”

Sweeney portrays Cecilia, a young nun who moves into a dark Italian convent, where she discovers she is pregnant, despite being a virgin. Sweeney recently starred in romantic comedy “Anyone But You” and action film “Madame Web.”

“Immaculate” director Michael Mohan previously worked with Sweeney on the Netflix coming-of-age series “Everything Sucks!” and the Prime Video erotic thriller “The Voyeurs.”

Sweeney, 26, first auditioned for “Immaculate” a decade ago, around the time she attended Saint George’s private school in north Spokane. When she first auditioned, “Immaculate” writer Andrew Lobel told the SXSW crowd that Sweeney and the main character were younger, and it was set at a boarding school.

“It wasn’t until years later that I think we really finally figured out what the movie needed to be and Mike and Sydney were integral on that,” Lobel said. “We drew from an entirely different section of movies, we start looking at classic nunsploitation movies, and suddenly the movie knew what it wanted to be at its core.”

Sweeney is listed as a producer on the film.

“I am a very hands-on collaborator,” Sweeney told the Los Angeles Times last week. “I like being able to give ideas, be a part of it, help come up with solutions. It just changes the whole process.

“It’s so hard for me now to be on a set and not be able to help in any type of way and be able to take action. And being able to actually have a voice and have a valued opinion – it means so much. And I still have a billion things to learn, but I love being able to be a part of the process from the beginning to the end. I’ve always built my characters from the ground up. And so I feel like I’m getting to do that on an entire script-level.”

“Immaculate” also stars Simona Tabasco (of “The White Lotus” fame), Àlvaro Morte, Benedetta Porcaroli, Giorgio Colangeli, Dora Romano and Giampiero Judica.

“Immaculate” is now in theaters.