Elevating Horror How director Jordan Graham found the scares for his breakthrough indie-horror hit 'Sator' in the mountains above Silicon Valley April 28, 2021 by Steve Palopoli TAKING HIS SHOT: Jordan Graham shooting a climactic scene for 'Sator' in Yosemite. Most of the film was shot in Santa Cruz, mainly in the Santa Cruz Mountains. It streams on Shudder beginning May 10. In the early days of film's rise as a global phenomenon, European filmmakers developed the idea of "pure cinema," a style that relies as much as possible on visual storytelling. For its most extreme adherents, any exposition at all delivered by title cards (in the silent era), narration or even dialogue is considered a betrayal of the cinematic ideal.