WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Sweet Girl, available to stream now on Netflix.

Netflix's Sweet Girl reunites star and producer Jason Momoa with filmmaker Brian Andrew Mendoza, who makes his feature directorial debut with the film after working as a producer on projects like Frontier. The thriller follows working-class family man Ray Cooper (Jason Moma), who raises his daughter Rachel (Isabela Merced) after his wife dies due to profiteering from the pharmaceutical industry. Vowing revenge, Ray decides to take the fight to those responsible for his wife's death, with Rachel drawn into the increasingly bloody conflict.

In an exclusive interview with CBR, Mendoza shared why he chose this project to be his directorial debut, praised the benefits of filming the movie on location in Pittsburgh, and discussed the importance of focusing on emotional stakes amidst hard-hitting action.

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I love that the action in this movie isn't glamorous. It's tough and often claustrophobic. Was that always something you wanted to do with fight coordinator Jeremy Marinas as you were staging these fights?

Brian Andrew Mendoza: Yeah, Jeremy and [stunt coordinator] Jon Valera, we really wanted to make it [like that]. It's important because this character is a blue-collar character. He's not a Navy SEAL trained killer. He's just this regular guy. We wanted the fights to feel like they were being fought by somebody who's just a regular guy who knows how to box. Each setting, like the elevator fight, ended up being claustrophobic [with that] just built into it. We wanted it to feel like it was punching you in the face a bit.

In addition to Jason's rawer fights, I feel like this movie takes him to the most emotionally raw places we've seen from him for a while. How was it getting him to that place and using handheld cameras to move in and make those scenes and cinematography more kinetic?

Barry Ackroyd, who's amazing, shot the film and he's a handheld operator and handles them himself. We really wanted, from the emotional scene in the hallway where the camera is following him, we didn't want anything to feel like it was ever staged. We wanted it to feel off-the-cuff. Whenever we shot, we shot with three cameras but never put the marks down. The cameras, we would run a scene twice and look at it and go, "Let's move a camera so we can get this thing."

It was a really organic process and, in the end, I thought it was good because I personally don't like that over-the-shoulder view where you know where you're going to be. I was always trying to place the camera the way where you don't know where it's going to be next and, in doing so, put in those areas during an emotional scene or an action scene where it just got in your face and made you connect with the characters.

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You previously worked with Jason on Frontier. How has creative shorthand grown since then, especially for this project?

We're always drawn to human-driven stories and the humanity in this story, with the father and daughter, is something that we both gravitated towards and made us want to make this film. The element of shooting in Pittsburgh wasn't easy and Frontier wasn't easy because you're shooting in these cold areas. I think what we were focused on with Sweet Girl was we always put that emotion and characters first and then we looked at the action with the stunt team and how does that action support what the characters are doing. That's always sort of been our style, we didn't really change much except for the fact that I was the one yelling "action" and "cut" this time, I hadn't done that yet.

What was it about this project that you wanted to make this your feature directorial debut?

It was two-fold. One was the reveal: I was terrified after reading it in the script because it's something that I felt works or doesn't work. I love a good challenge and, in hindsight, I look back and go, "That was crazy for you to decide to do that as your first feature."

That was part of it; but, being able to explore. I had a lot of fun with Bela and Jason exploring these characters and the loss of the wife and mother and finding them in a broken place and having these antagonists come towards them and having them work through it and work towards the reveal. Most reveals that happen in movies, happen in the last five minutes, like The Usual Suspects. With this, we got to sit with the character and spend twenty more minutes and got us to continue to explore what we set up for it and it makes it all ebb and flow with each other.

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In terms of ebb and flow, once this movie is about twenty minutes in, it just moves with this rollercoaster ride. How was it maintaining that pace and intensity, especially as you're editing it all together and taking Bela's character on this ride?

I'm really glad you pointed it out because we were really mindful that we didn't want the film to drag. We wanted this movie to breathe in the opening because we also knew you only get to do that once in the movie, so if the audience is going to let us do that, we need to deliver and make sure that once we do kick it off, we go and it keeps going. That was just something that we always looked at, how to continually push this forward so that it just keeps ratcheting up. I always felt that in this movie, the tension just keeps going and going until the end, the end fight.

As good as Jason is in this movie, I feel like it's really a showcase for Bela.

Absolutely! I think it's her story because, after the subway, he's not part of the movie anymore. It's from a different perspective.

How was it working with her on those scenes? The last time I saw her, she was in Dora the Explorer!

I think she just digested and absorbed it and took it and ran with it in her own way. She gave such a strong performance that I'm so proud of and so glad you commented on because I can't wait for people to see her in this and the action and fighting for her too. This is the first time she's really done action and that end fountain fight, she's doing her own stunts. She came in on weekends doing those stunts with us and it was a lot but she knew the character and I think you need that from your actors. You kind of guide them to where the story is going but really, at the end of the day, they sometimes need to understand those characters better than you do. I know she really understood what Rachel is going through and has such a great dynamic with it.

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You mentioned you had some anxiety with the movie's big twist. How did you work through that?

There were different iterations. We really wanted it to be character-driven and emotionally resonate with the audience and not trick them. We really wanted it to be part of the narrative and through the relationship with the FBI agent and the phone calls that she has to build up so, when we got at that moment, there's a foundation that had been built up to that that suddenly and dramatically made it work.

You mentioned the logistical challenges of filming in Pittsburgh but you really do showcase the city, including parts I've never seen on film before. How was it finding spots to shoot, while you were location scouting, that worked for the story?

Originally, the script took place in New York and we scouted two locations, New York and Pittsburgh. The initial idea was that we would use Pittsburgh for New York but, as soon as I got to Pittsburgh, I was like, "This is amazing!" It was the first time I had ever been to Pittsburgh and I started doing research on the pharmaceutical companies there. Honestly, there is no better blue collar town for Ray Cooper than Pittsburgh. We needed to adapt it to be Pittsburgh.

When we adapted it towards Pittsburgh, it became a lot of fun because we were already there and looking at all these amazing locations. When you think about it, a baseball stadium on the water with bridges next to downtown, a production designer couldn't design something as beautiful as that. I feared I wouldn't catch Pittsburgh in the best way, I wanted to make sure that people felt like this was Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh is a beautiful city.

Now that this movie is out in the world, what are you most excited about as you take Ray and Rachel on this emotional rollercoaster ride?

I think that's it. I really hope that people enjoy it and are connected and invested in the characters because I always feel that, if you're invested in the characters then the action is going to hit you even harder and be more entertaining. When you get to the end of the film, it's something that really grabbed you and was visceral [for] you. I feel like it's an honor for somebody to take the time to watch something that's two hours or something and they're really glad they took the time to sit down and watch it. I hope that people feel that way after watching this.

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With you taking the director's chair for this, what statement did you want to make with this project?

As a filmmaker and just a lover of cinema, I love action but the thing I always focused on was if there's no action in this movie, would you still be invested in the drama between characters. That's the one thing that I was really strongly focusing on with the film, the characters and arcs that they were going through, and the devastation of the family. I love character-driven stuff and I love the fact that this is engulfed in action and there's a big level to it and so stoked that this story allows us to show both of them and you don't see that very often. If there wasn't a father-daughter family element to it, I don't know if I would've done it.

The opening to this movie is really heartbreaking. You give us just enough hope before you take it away.

I know, it's a tearjerker. We wanted to grab that emotional side of it and, hopefully as a viewer, if we got you at that point of the movie, all we've got to do is keep you there in that seat.

How is it working with Netflix as a partner sending this thing out worldwide?

It's insane to think that this is going to a global audience on the same day. That's always a huge shock for me, but it's great. Sitting here as a first-time filmmaker, I never thought I'd have the opportunity to make this big of a film as a first film and for them to believe in me in order to go do it and be a good creative partner, I think it's great. You don't see that anywhere else and I don't think I could make this movie, with me directing, than any other place than Netflix.

Directed and produced by Brian Andrew Mendoza, Sweet Girl premieres on Netflix Aug. 20.

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