Clement Virgo refuses to be pinned down. From his masterful film Brother, to the darkly seductive Lie With Me, and The Book of Negroes, he crafts emotive and refreshingly rich stories on screen. Steal Away is his best work to date.
The film is an atmospheric, lush, and evocative re-imagining of author Karolyn Smardz Frost’s non-fiction book Steal Away Home, and it weaves mystery and magic with a Gothic turn.
Virgo sat down to talk about bringing his “dark fairy tale” to life, and chatted with me about everything from the challenges of adaptation to the his creative process, and working with stars Angourie Rice as Fannie, and Mallori Johnson as Cรฉcile.
From history to a tale of two princesses
Virgo approached the adaptation of Steal Away Home with the goal of creating something outside the standard period piece. Compared to Lawrence Hill’s The Book of Negroes, Virgo wanted to find a different lens; one that felt more like an allegory.
“I approached Tamara [Berger] because we made one other film together,” Virgo said, adding that “Tamara writes young women very well. I asked her to collaborate with me… and just try to find a language; try to find a genre to filter this story through.”
“We came up with this kind of fairy tale–a dark fairy tale, if you will–of these two young princesses… who kind of imbue the story with am aesthetic that was timeless and that was–in a way, as an audience member–you’re trying to puzzle out.”
Virgo uses this framing to transcend some of the constraints of the historical setting, and the style makes it hard to pin down exactly when or where it’s taking place.
“Hopefully it doesn’t confuse the audience,” he noted, “but once you [follow the] thread of the film you say, ‘Oh, the film is speaking about the past through the allegory of these two young women.'”
Gothic Horror and mashing up genres
Visually, Steal Away is one of Virgo’s most awe-inspiring films to date, right alongside Brother. The cinematography is a visual feast, rich and vibrant. Virgo describes the film as a “mashup” of genres, and he gave a nod to another director who always skilfully mixes genres and tones.
“The idea of a Gothic quality was something that was in the design, [and] was also in the storytelling approach,” Virgo said.
“A sort of mixing of a fairy tale quality with elements of horror, elements of mystery, [and] kind of psycho-sexual elements as well. I love films that have a mashup of genres,” he said. “I think Guillermo del Toro does this excellently, where he mashes a Gothic love story with horror and fairy tales.”
“It’s really an attempt to find a way in, and to smuggle in ideas into these stories, and to try to create a unique world. I wasn’t that interested in shooting a cell phone or seeing people sitting in front of a computer,” he said. “It’s not a digital world. It’s not an AI world. It’s a very analog world that we wanted to create.”
Chemistry
Steal Away centres on the relationship between Cรฉcile and Fannie, and the film’s stars created a sense of friendship, tension, and longing.
Virgo cast the two actresses separately and didn’t have an opportunity to see how they would work together until production began in Belgium.
“The first time [they met], I was nervous,” Virgo admitted. “I didn’t know if the chemistry would work. But the first time I saw them together and have them read together, I was relieved because they both… brought [a lot of] ideas.”
“As a filmmaker you kind of hand over the characters to the actresses; to the performers. I try not to mess it up with my direction if I could help it, just help be a kind of guide and a kind of audience, to help shape the performances and the story and the characters.”
The result between Rice and Johnson is electric. It’s a weird and yet kind of wonderful relationships that’s difficult to pin down. Between them, Fannie is naive and eccentric, while Cรฉcile is strong, bold, and magnetic.
A shift in style: From Brother to Steal Away
For fans of Virgoโs film, Brother, Steal Away is a shift in tone, and Virgo was very purposeful about the way he approached Steal Away differently. The two films are contrast in many ways, including that Virgo created Brother to be precise, and a biographical exploration of the immigrant experience in Canada.
His approach for Steal Away was to experiment with a different style to match the story and tone.
“Brother is a more naturalistic film,” he said, “a much more biographical film in terms of my own experiences as an immigrant coming to Canada.”
“Steal Away was an attempt to make something that was bold. Brother has a kind of male energy in it; I was trying to find a much more female energy with Steal Away. Brother was a much more kind of considered formal film where Steal Away is a little bit more shaggy in terms of the ideas and the approach, and to not have such a tight grip on the story–just experiment, and follow all the aesthetic ideas and story ideas I was feeling at that time.”
The power of mystery
For any film to succeed, Virgo believes that the key is in the unknown. For Steal Away, he wanted to leave the audience with lingering questions and haunting imagery.
“I think mystery is essential to story. Mystery and suspense,” Virgo said.
“Hitchcock laid down the template for us… there’s a question that is at the heart, and a mystery at the heart of the story that hopefully the audience will go on a ride with you, and have that sense of inevitability. Part of my job as a storyteller is to make a promise to you, and to keep you watching–to keep you in it–and to hopefully have some kind of effect.”
“I like films that linger, films that affect me and make me think about them; what did that imagery mean? I love films like that.”
Steal Away is a testament to Virgo’s evolving craft and style, a haunting mystery, and a deeply atmospheric work of cinema. The film opens in theatres on July 17, 2026. Watch my full interview with Clement Virgo above.
Photos courtesy of Elevation Pictures.
