David Duchovny is sitting on the porch of a farmhouse about an hour north of Vancouver, squinting into the wintry afternoon sun. It’s late in the process of shooting The X-files: I Want to Believe, and he’s pondering the choice Agent Mulder had to make in the series finale: perfect happiness or the truth? “I don’t’ think of Mulder as a happy guy” Duchovny says. “He’s like a quest hero. That’s why I like him so much. He just doesn’t give up.” Costar Gillian Anderson passes by on her way to the set. “It’s all lies!” she yells out with a grin.


Hey, it might be—after all, “deceive, inveigle, obfuscate” was one of the TV show’s taglines during its nine-season run on Fox. But six years after the series ended (and a decade sine the last film), the new movie promises to be a lot more straight-forward than fans of the show might expect.

If the next location we're escorted to is any indication, 'creepy' is an understatement. It's an ancient-looking building in downtown Vancouver which was a mental hospital before it was abandoned 15 years ago, and boasts a ghost lodging on the third floor. Fortunately, tonight's action is being shot only one level up, where the corridors have been dressed with crucifixes, stained-glass windows and statues of weeping saints. This, in the film, will be Our Lady Of Sorrows Hospital, the Catholic infirmary where Dana Scully works as a doctor.

During a scene she's shooting, which involves Scully, a bed-ridden boy and a vulture-like priest, Gillian Anderson wanders over to explain how it feels to play the flame-haired icon again. "It was odd at first, as I'd consciously chosen a lot of parts that were different from Scully. Now, coming back to her, sometimes my brain fights that and I have to struggle to do things I'd programmed myself not to do. But it's great working with David again. We put on our costumes again for the first time, looked at each other and went, 'Oh! It's Mulder and Scully!' And we love chatting nonsense together. Last night there was a conversation between David and Chris and I about the degree to which you get bloated after you eat sushi..."

It's nearing 3am and there's still no sign of Fox Mulder himself, although there is a midget scampering about in kids' pyjamas, doubling for the now-departed child actor. But suddenly word comes through that David Duchovny is en route from his hotel to begin his long night of filming. Empire is escorted to 'the chapel', the site of Our Lady Of Sorrow's confessional box, to await the star, who appropriately enough has his own confession to make.

"You know, even though we went around doing press for the first movie saying, 'You don't need to see the TV show to see this', that was pretty much a lie." Duchovny leans back, turning on his trademark lazy smile. "My hope for this one is that that statement would be true. That this will stand alone as a scary thriller, in the tradition of Silence Of The Lambs, and as a fun action movie. If we get to do more movies, then we can get back into the mythology and all that stuff. But with this, we're getting back to what made the first couple of seasons of the show great, before we got wrapped up in our own storytelling. The horror-movie-of-the-week aspect."

Still munching sunflower seeds, still hunting for answers. Has Mulder changed at all? "Well, it's 15 years on from when he was introduced, so playing him the same way would be like having a 50 year-old stripper on screen. But he's still on a quest. The essence of this character is to believe. So he's active, he's searching. I wouldn't believe it if he weren't. If everything falls away, that's what the guy does, whether or not it's his job anymore."