2026, 112 mins., R
***1/2 out of ****
Written and Directed by Jane Schoenbrun
Produced by Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner
Cast: Hannah Einbinder, Gillian Anderson, Jack Haven, Patrick Fischler
“Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” is another one of those films that I walked into knowing nothing about it. I was surprised, shocked, and elated by the film’s originality, satire, extreme carnage, sexual provocation (FYI no teenagers have sex), visual style, ability to put a message on the screen without making it overt, generic, or hamfisted. The is what it looks like when someone puts gay themes on the screen with an authentic voice, not the pandering type that we usually get these days.
After decades of nonstop sequels and various success, the Camp Miasma film series is ready to be rebooted with a fresh take for today’s audiences. Queer filmmaker Kris Williams (Hannah Einbinder) is hired for the job. Though the series is transphobic, involving a character called Little Death who was a boy who transformed from boy to girl at weekly intervals and was subsequently drowned by hateful campers, Kris feels a unique attachment to it and is eager to take on the assignment. She even picks up a DVD copy of one the sequels at a convenience store.
Part of the assignment involves her driving to meet Billy Pressley (Gillian Anderson) who abruptly retired after playing the sole surviving camp counselor in the first movie. Billy lives on the same site that was used for the original movie in the Pacific Northwest where indulges in an obsession she has with Little Death. She is very welcoming to Kris and together they engage in deep conversations about life, love, and what Camp Miasma means in today’s world. Kris is timid at first and has very reserved feelings for Billy while admitting that the series is something that has dated and unacceptable in today’s world. Billy is warm, open, and both captivated and troubled by the film’s impact. She says “Woke” mockingly at one point and thinks that kind of culture is the problem with today’s world.
The film boldly explores sexual themes between these two women as each of them shares a connection to it that positively turns them on. As they become more attracted to each other, Billy reveals that she is turned on by the image of Little Death being reflected in the eyeball of her partner when he’s about to murder them. Kris reveals that she can done only enjoy sex if she as a sexualized final girl.
The film bends reality in unique ways to illustrate the character’s separate obsessions. There’s one sequence in which Billy imagines an extended sequence in which Little Death goes on a killing spree dispatching no less than 20 victims in a single shot that is set to Counting Crows “Long December”. This is shot is particularly amazing as it begins with Little Death’s POV and then the cameras around to hold him in closeup as he continues killing his many victims. The song choice adds an appropriate tone of melancholy to underscore the act of revenge.
I won’t reveal what happens throughout most of the movie because you need to see it and allow it to surprise you. I was hooked to it because e it in many ways satirizes our need to pigeonhole anything that’s old as not standing up today’s culture simply because it happens to offend our overly sensitive sensibilities. It refreshingly and completely mocks this notion by presenting scenes in which Billy is openly captivated by the movie she starred in and ignores Kris who keeps pointing everything she thinks is wrong with it. It also points out how this POV will ultimately end up losing because you can’t totally cancel what has already been widely embraced.
Schoenbrun shows a lot of hallucinogenic ideas and various stylistic techniques throughout the film to pinpoint their approach to the reality bending horror (with an over-reliance on cartoonish CGI blood) and the two women as objects of each other’s desire. The mix is hypnotic and kind of fascinating and the impact is really amazing.
