A punk rock band finds themselves trapped in a room full of blood-thirsty skinheads in Green Room, the hotly anticipated indie title from director Jeremy Saulnier. His last two films, Murder Party and Blue Ruin, were also tense and violent stories, so an obvious pattern is emerging in the celebrated director’s work.

Patrick Stewart and Anton Yelchin are both Star Trek vets and they also lead the Green Room cast on opposite ends of a very gory situation. On one side of the door there’s a grungy band desperate to escape a musical venue after witnessing a murder, and on the other side are the white supremacists determined to keep them there and clean up the mess.

Jeremy Saulnier and Anton Yelchin recently traveled to San Francisco to talk about Green Room and its unique filmmaking process. The following is a transcription of that conversation.

Q: With Green Room and your first film, Murder Party, you’re telling a story in a single location. Was that a deliberate choice?

Jeremy Saulnier: After Murder Party I swore I’d never do it again, so I’m an idiot. I learned a lot about what people tell you to do and what’s cheaper to do, which is to shoot a movie in one location so you have control over it. But cinematically, I found it lacking. So for Blue Ruin I did the opposite, lots of locations, lots of open air, that’s more of what I was attracted to. With Green Room, I loved the idea but was resisting because of the contained siege scenario.

Q: Anton, your choice of characters to play is very diverse and mostly they have a keen intellect. Is that something you look for when you’re selecting a new role?

Anton Yelchin: I just realized I should find someone stupid to play. I think for me it’s just different, at this point I just want to be doing different kinds of characters and changing physicality. It’s hard because movies don’t come out in order and sometimes they never come out. It’s hard to plan your creative trajectory because something that I may have done three years ago may come out tomorrow and three years ago I was on that creative page but not anymore. So for me it’s about trying to find new things.

Saulnier: I can attest that Anton is an over-thinker. He really brings it to the set and he gave me a phone book worth of notes on his character. That’s what I love because in the crush of production you want actors who can protect the integrity of their characters. Anton had a lot of weight on his shoulders because this movie is so physical.

Yelchin: I think it’s about focus. I know Jeremy’s really busy, but I still selfishly send him all that stuff because even if it’s a two word approval, I still need that approval so in the morning I can use that and go to work.

Q: This film is very fast-paced in terms of storytelling and cutting to the chase. Did you have any extra character moments you didn’t use in the final cut?

Saulnier: With Green Room we’re not going for long, contrived plot twists and injected character conflicts and love stories that don’t belong. It’s just this insane visceral experience. It’s an overnight clusterfuck and it’s terrifying. It’s designed to be the most tense film I could ever imagine. We were kind of agnostic in terms of genre, but I approached it as a war film. It’s a siege scenario that has elements that could be attributed to the horror genre, certainly graphic violence, but the way I approached it with actors and production design was a very grounded war film, but on one side of the door there’s amateurs.

Q: Jeremy, when you’re running that kind of set, what’s your technique with actors?

Saulnier: Anton, what’s my technique?

Yelchin: I still don’t know, dude.

Green Room is now playing in limited release.