Director John Woo’s remake of the action classic The Killer ticked off several moments on the career bucket list for stars Nathalie Emmanuel and Omar Sy. The pair were particularly touched when they experienced their own signature bird moment – a typical visual motif for the filmmaker, in which the animal is in flight during an action sequence.

“I feel like I may have messed up a take because I had this ‘I can’t believe this’ moment when it happened,” Emmanuel laughs as we chat in a Beverly Hills suite. “I thought, ‘I shouldn’t be smiling, but I know I am.’ Then it happened and it hit me. You’re in a John Woo movie and the birds are flying and you think, ‘Oh, this is incredible.'”

“You just said it perfectly. It’s on my bucket list,” Sy added. “While it’s happening, you can’t help but step out of character for a moment. Inside, you’re like a little kid jumping around and screaming. It’s an incredible experience to have.”

This is what “The Killer” is about

The Killer In The 40 Years of War, Woo reinterprets his 1989 Hong Kong classic. In the role previously held by Chow Yun-fat, Emmanuel plays Zee, a contract killer who is hired to kill a young blind singer. She refuses and instead attracts the attention of Sy’s police detective. It is not long before Zee has the police and her sinister mentor and supervisor on her tail. The Killer is now streaming on Peacock.

“It was a safe bet because when you’re working with the director of the previous film and he’s thought long and hard about whether to remake it, you feel very safe following him without a safety net,” enthuses Sy. “He knows the previous film better than anyone else. He knows exactly where he wants to go now. We could watch the original film over and over again because we were sure this one would be different.”

“Of course, that’s partly because Nathalie is the murderer this time. That would change the story and she would bring what she brings. Also, this version is set in Paris. Even though the original film is a classic and we know it almost by heart, we knew we would be going in a different direction with this.”

Emmanuel continues: “It speaks to the fact that John wants to live out a very different energy this time. The fact that I’m obviously a woman immediately changes the energy. Even the way she kills and the way she lives her life is very much influenced by that. Because the original is such a classic and iconic, we were able to enjoy it for what it is and then take everything we love about it and be inspired by it.”

“When I saw the original film, I knew that was exactly what I wanted to do. I love Chow Yun-fat’s performance and wanted to be inspired by that. I also wanted to bring in everything we love about John Woo because he inspired an entire genre of cinema. Without John, the action genre wouldn’t be what it is, so I wanted to incorporate all of that. I also wanted to think independently about who Zee is and how I wanted her to be.”

John Woo wanted to make “The Killer” more human

This time, Woo wanted to explore Zee as a human.

“She has a lot of emotions,” Emmanuel enthuses. “A lot of classic action stereotypes are that everyone is very tough and strict, and he said, ‘I want her vulnerability and this conflict inside her to really come through.’ I loved that he wanted to approach it that way.”

Both Sy, known for Jurassic World And lupineand the British actress, known for game of Thrones and several Fast and Furious films, are lifelong fans of their director.

“The first John Woo I ever saw was In the face/outand then I went back to his catalog The Killer,” she remembers. “I’m trying to remember what was next. The Killer came out the year I was born, so I had to wait to see it.”

“It was The Killer for me, but I remember not seeing it in the theater,” Sy adds. “I got it from one of those rental stores and it was on VHS. I remember watching it almost weekly with my friends because it was like something new to us. We had never seen anything like it before, so we watched it a lot.”

“The Killer” is packed with breathtaking action sequences

Like the original vision, Woo’s new take on his source material is action-packed. Both Emmanuel and Sy are comfortable with physical roles; The Killer was a completely new experience.

“It’s pretty intense. The training was pretty extensive and it evolved and changed a lot because John was very involved in that process. He works with the stunt team, the choreographers and coordinators and John is also very open to how the actors think about how that character might fight or do things,” she explains. “It’s a real collaboration. It’s very ballet-like and almost like a dance the way you interact with the camera when you’re shooting. It’s very technical, specific and quite intimate with the camera. When you’re kicking, punching, rolling and spinning, you’d think the cameras would be at a safe distance, but he’s right there in the middle of it. Honestly, a lot of times it’s your movement that dictates what the camera does, not the other way around. It’s crazy.”

However, there were several moments where the action was so precise that both Emmanuel and Sy thought it would take forever to get the shot. In one of these scenes, a gun on a bench was thrown into the air and the actress had to catch it.

“I was so nervous about it,” she recalls. “It was practical, so they set up a table where you could throw the gun. I felt like I could either do it or it would be the opposite and I’d mess it up, but I got that pretty quickly. I was like, ‘Oh my God. I can’t believe I did that.’ Like, I’m not a good bowler, but I hit a strike and I’m like, ‘Did everyone see that?’ That’s how it was. On a set like that, you can’t determine where the gun goes because a guy fell on it and knocked the thing over. It was surprising because we weren’t on take 15 or 20. It happened in a lot fewer takes, and that was a surprise to everyone, especially me.”

Sy adds: “One of the things that was a little tricky for me was the stunt at the police station when we had to grab the big banner and slide down. That was really tricky, so we were happy when we got a good shot. The motorcycle shot was also tricky, so we gave up when we got a good shot there too.”

“It was a very difficult time,” Emmanuel continues. “I thought for a while that this was actually a real cemetery and that we might not be showing respect to the people buried there. I felt a bit strange about it, but then someone said, ‘It’s not real, Nathalie,’ and that reassured me.”

“The Killer” is not lacking in icons

Something else that made the actress feel good was a nod to her British heritage in the form of a mention of the legendary British retail giant Marks and Spencer.

“It was in the script, I really liked that,” she laughed. “As a Brit, I thought, ‘Yeah, that’s hilarious, but it’s also a really good shop to buy a suit.’ So I thought, but, you know, Tessier, the character in the film, is of course a very special, very high-end tailor in Paris, so that line really made me laugh. I loved that I got to say that because it brought my British identity into the film.”

Besides Sy and Emmanuel, The Killer The cast includes Sam Worthington, Saïd Taghmaoui, Tchéky Karyo and football star and actor Eric Cantona, who plays a crime boss. Both actors are rarely star-struck and enjoyed being in the same room as the sporting icon.

“We didn’t have any scenes together, but I went on set to see him because I wanted to have that image and be like, ‘I’m in the movie with him.’ I couldn’t wait for the movie to come out,” Sy admits. “He’s a legend and I’m a football fan so I love Eric Cantona, but he’s also a great actor now. I was so happy and proud to be in a movie with him so I had to go and meet him.”

Emmanuel concludes: “I definitely get a lot of recognition when someone says, ‘Wait a minute, Eric Cantona is in your film?’ and I say, ‘Yes, of course he is.’ He’s a legend. He’s not just in the film, he’s really great in it.”