In this tale of spell binding suspense, something evil lurks just beneath the lush surfaces of teenaged girl's private school world - and it holds the rights to her very soul. Now, on the eve of her 18th birthday, Molly Hartley is about to discover the truth of just who, or rather what, it is she is destined to become.

BD: The plot to the film is pretty cryptic, what’s your spin on the story?

ML: The plot revolves around a young girl who’s about to turn eighteen and is trying to make a fresh start after her mother’s psychotic break. She doesn’t know who she can trust – including her friends and her parents. In the same way that Rosemary’s Baby dealt with a woman who was pregnant and didn’t know if what she was going through was because she was having a child or if something was really wrong, Molly doesn’t know if she’s just getting older, becoming a woman, maybe becoming like her mother, or if her life really is spinning out of control. A lot of Molly’s fears are common for girls who are her age. It’s all about figuring out who’s on your side and who’s not, who wants what’s best for you, and who doesn’t.

BD: How did you end up attached to direct?

ML: I had produced features and television and decided that I really wanted to direct a movie around the time that my producing partner Jennifer Hilton and I found this script. I thought this would be a great first movie to direct because I’ve always loved horror movies, especially ‘70s era horror – Carrie, The Omen, The Shining, Rosemarie’s Baby – and I loved working with teens after producing Go, Everwood, and Jack and Bobby. So I thought it would be really interesting to work with teens in this genre that I’ve always loved.

BD: Did you have any input with the shooting script?

ML: Yes. We bought the script, but at the time it was more of an idea about a girl who the devil was after. So we were able to add a lot to the script as far as the religious themes, the backstory, and the psychological elements that are haunting her.

BD: Was this always planned to be a PG-13 horror film? Is there more footage for DVD?

ML: Yes, it was always supposed to be PG-13. There are a few moments we had to cut that we can put on a DVD which would have pushed the film into an R. But I wanted to make this for a younger audience because it’s about teens and that time in your life when your world is completely changing. They’re exactly the audience the movie was made for.

BD: What type of horror fans is this for?

ML: It’s not for fans of the hard R movies – the Saws and Hostels. I wanted to do something that was different – that was psychological and had all the jumps, but that had something that got under your skin. And I wanted to keep it as real as possible to make it feel like this could happen to you.

BD: What type of scares can we expect?

ML: I tried to get the audience to, first and foremost, really care about the characters. We worked really hard on all the characters, even the smaller roles, so the audience really gets drawn into the story. Scares are, I think, that much scarier when there’s a personal connection. There are also a lot of moments in the movie where you let down your guard and think, “Molly’s going to be fine,” and once you start to relax something will happen out of the blue. For me that’s the scariest, when you realize you can’t relax, cause something will always happen when you least expect it.

BD: This film had a different title originally, right? What was it called and why did you change the name?

ML: It was originally titled “She Lived.” “Lived” spelled backwards is “devil,” and we really liked that, but the distributor felt “The Haunting of Molly Hartley” fit the film better. We also thought that having the name “Molly Hartley” in the title was a lot more personal than “She Lived.” With so much happening to Molly – she’s being haunted by a lot of people and places and things that happened in her life – we wanted you to feel like you knew Molly Hartley when you walked into the theater.

BD: Was it a tough battle getting this in theaters?

ML: No, our distributor did a great job and they got it into over 2500 screens, so we’ve been very fortunate. They picked such a great release date with the movie coming out on Halloween, and also the cast has been a huge draw for theaters. I think you’ll look back at this movie in ten years and be amazed that all these great actors are in this one movie.

BD: What do you have planned next, more horror? If so, can you talk a bit about them….

ML: I love this genre and would love to do another horror film. Hopefully, if Molly Hartley does well, we can start work on a sequel. I’m also interested in finding something that plays a little older. Still horror, but a bit older than teens and high school.