By STEPHANIE McGRATH -- AllPop
"I know there's a lot of murders and stuff going on, but as long as you don't take it too seriously, it's fine."
No, 25-year-old Eva Mendes isn't a deranged serial killer. She's an actress in the upcoming horror flick, "Urban Legends: Final Cut".
The teen-esque sequel to 1998's "Urban Legends" opens in theatres on Sept. 22, and this time around it's a bunch of unsuspecting film students who suffer the wrath of a nasty murderer.
"Well, it's basically a bunch of film-school students who fall prey to a murderer who murders based on urban legends, and as the movie is going on, we're filming our own student film so there's a lot of confusion," Eva says. "It's kind of a film within a film. Um ... that's all I'll say. It's a fun ride."
In "Urban Legends: Final Cut" Eva's character Vanessa finds herself close to danger when she develops a crush on Amy (played by Jennifer Morrison), who is making a movie to compete for her school's Hitchcock Award.
"She's got a crush on Amy so what happens is she does all these little odd jobs. She'll do the coffee or the food one day and she'll do the sound another day," says Eva about her character. "She stays in a situation she's uncomfortable with when she starts feeling that something's wrong with all these people dropping, but she really has a crush on Amy so that's her reason for staying."
In the first "Urban Legends" movie, characters met their death by methods described in age-old scary stories most often told around scout campfires or at slumber parties. Although Eva won't give away any of the legends used to kill off characters in the new movie, she did talk about her personal favourite scary story: the legend of Bloody Mary.
"You would go into the bathroom by yourself and turn off all the lights and you'd knock on the mirror three times and say 'Bloody Mary', and then this witch with long hair and long nails would come out and you'd see her," she says. "This was going on in elementary school all the time. I had a kitty at one point and new kitties scratch a lot and my arm was all scratched up and I went to school and said that it was Bloody Mary and she got me in the bathroom, and everybody would gather around me at lunch and be like, 'Oh my God'".
Eva, who says her favourite scary movies include "The Shining" ("It still scares the crap out of me," she says) and "The Exorcist", knows that some people may be raising their eyebrows at a horror flick that seems to be marketed directly at those who could be too young to see the film (which is restricted). But the young actress points out that it is, after all, just a movie.
"I have a 12-year-old nephew, and 12 is really young, but he's so mature and he's been brought up so well and I think he can handle it," Eva says. "We explain to the kids in my family that it's just a movie. We tell them what happens and how many people are around when I'm alone (on film) ... and how I wasn't really alone. It depends how much the kids know, I think."
Eva still isn't sure what she'll be doing once the hoopla surrounding "Urban Legends: Final Cut" settles. Two and a half years ago she was working at a p.r. company part-time and majoring in marketing at college.
"You know, L.A, it's just so easy to meet a manager or somebody," she says. "It just happened to be that somebody saw a picture of me through a neighbour and said, 'Oh, have her call us', and I didn't at first because it's happened before, you know, and it was just like, 'Oh God', 'cause you can't trust anybody here, but I actually ended up calling and it just happened."
For now, Eva plans to enjoy the squealing joy that horror fans will get from "Urban Legends".
*Check out the "Urban Legends:Final Cut" official
site where you can make your own urban legend.
