The Big Picture

• Kaitlyn Dever delivers a magnificent, wordless performance filled with anxiety and emotion in No One Will Save You .
• Brynn battles extraterrestrials and is eventually spared by them, but the reason behind their decision is divisive and intriguing.
• The aliens are fascinated by Brynn's grief and pain, as it is something unknown to them, and they appreciate human culture and art.

Editor's Note: This article contains major spoilers for No One Will Save You. No One Will Save You showcases Kaitlyn Dever at her most magnificent, almost entirely wordless, and displaying a powerhouse performance based on sheer physical anxiety and emotion. Dever plays Brynn, a young woman struggling with unexplained grief who finds herself in the middle of a home invasion — from outer space.

Brynn battles ferociously against the extraterrestrials, but they eventually overwhelm her, threatening to use her as a host like they do the rest of the townspeople who have shunned her, but in the end, they spare her, leaving her to live a life where the puppet-humans now embrace her as one of their own. The ending is sure to be divisive but, speaking with Collider's Editor-in-Chief Steve Weintraub, the film's director Brian Duffield has explained why the aliens chose to let Brynn retain her mind, body, and soul.

"One of the things we talked about a lot was that I like the idea that the aliens didn't know what grief was," explained Duffield. "That just kind of felt like an interesting launching. Obviously, they don't articulate that they don't know what grief is, but that just felt like a very interesting thing; like, as a society, they have God and faith and all these different things, and they're really frustrated with her, but the times when they aren't even trying to kill her, it's very specifically because she's broken the plan of their faith, as opposed to, they're not there to murder everybody. So, that was something we talked about where they aren’t really mourning their dead."

'No One Will Save You' Examines What It Feels Like to Be Human

Duffield went on to describe that the pain Brynn was feeling was something, ironically, alien to the extraterrestrials that surprised them and that they had perhaps underestimated. Feeling her grief and suffering, they were more inclined to investigate further.

"But Kaitlyn is in such an interesting grief and lack of forgiveness space that I think they were just really — we talked a lot about it — they were just really like, 'This is really interesting that you feel so bad about this,' like, 'What is this?'"

Eagle-eyed (and eared) viewers of the film will have noticed Brynn isn't the only one carrying a tune with her throughout the movie. And that song plays a part in the aliens' final decision to spare her, as they appreciate the smaller details they begin to notice around their new surroundings — while they're there to command and conquer, they still appreciate cultures.

"How that ties into the end, where we talked a lot about them really loving art, and so the daddy long legs, the big guy, you hear him kind of doing like a little sing-song throughout the movie, which is the song that she's listening to throughout the movie," said Duffield.

Brynn is Safe From the Alien Jason Bourne

Their further understanding of Brynn's suffering, the director suggests, will influence their decision to allow her a shot at happiness. While she took out a number of their ranks, Duffield says she doesn't need to worry about any more of them coming back for revenge. He explained:

"He just kind of keeps singing it back to her because they're like, 'Songs are cool,' which again, this is all subtextual, I guess, but the idea being that they're conquerors, but they're also really into this human culture and everything. And then being like, 'Well, this grief is really interesting.' So I think that was always something where it was like, they weren't mourning their dead, but Kaitlyn was in a very interesting grief place, and so as they get to know her and her story, I think they're just like, 'This is very human and interesting.' So it's a little Vulcan-y. But yeah, I don't think six months later Jason Bourne is gonna come down and, like, kick her ass."

No One Will Save You is streaming on Hulu now.

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