There are horror movies with queer subtext, and then there’s Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, a film that gleefully drags all of that subtext into the light.
The latest feature from I Saw the TV Glow filmmaker Jane Schoenbrun stars Emmy winner Hannah Einbinder as Kris, an aspiring director who lands the opportunity to revive the long-dormant Camp Miasma slasher franchise. What begins as a research trip soon becomes something far stranger when Kris seeks out Billy (Gillian Anderson), the lone survivor from the original films. Their encounter evolves into an intimate relationship that forces Kris to reckon with her own identity while uncovering the tangled mythology surrounding the franchise and its infamous killer, Little Death.
The result is a wildly entertaining sapphic horror film that’s drenched in blood, lust and camp. Equal parts funny, grotesque and emotionally raw, Camp Miasma embraces everything audiences have long loved about queer horror while refusing to sanitize its more complicated history. Rather than simply celebrating the genre, Schoenbrun interrogates it, unpacking decades of queer coding, transphobia, repression and desire while delivering one of the year’s sexiest and most visually inventive horror films.
That complexity extends to Little Death, the franchise’s masked killer. Rather than presenting a straightforward monster, Camp Miasma intentionally embraces a complicated trans villain, inviting audiences to wrestle with horror’s often contradictory relationship with queer and trans representation instead of pretending those conversations don’t exist.
“I love how if you really watch, the movie isn’t just about slasher movies, it’s about slasher franchises,” Shoenbrun tells Gayety.
They laughed about how horror icons inevitably receive increasingly convoluted backstories over the course of a franchise.
“In the first one, he’s just the kid who got bullied at camp. But in the sixth one, he turns out to be sister-brother with the person from the first film, and they’re both spawns of Satan. It just gets so convoluted and crazy.”
That playful approach became the blueprint for Little Death.
Rather than offering one definitive explanation, Camp Miasma presents multiple conflicting origin stories before revealing that none of them are really the point.
“There’s a bunch of different origin stories we hear for Little Death,” Schoenbrun said. “But then there’s the story underneath all of the stories, which is that he’s kind of this eternal embodiment of desire.”
That idea becomes the beating heart of the film. Beneath every murder, flirtation and surreal twist lies an exploration of longing, repression and the ways horror has always wrestled with gender and sexuality.
“There’s a reason we remake these movies year after year after year,” Schoenbrun said. “We treat them almost like mating rituals. There’s a lot of anxiety in these movies about gender, sexuality and deviance. That’s just all in the soup.”
Instead of arguing that queer creators are reinventing horror, Schoenbrun sees Camp Miasma as acknowledging what has always been there.
“So how could it not be gay and weird?” they said with a smile. “It’s not us that are gay and weird. I mean, we are, but the history of these films are as well.”
Hannah Einbinder Found Liberation in Kris
At the center of all that bloodshed and desire is Einbinder, fresh off her Emmy-winning performance as Ava Daniels on Hacks. Here, she delivers one of her most intimate performances yet as Kris, a filmmaker whose obsession with reviving a cult horror franchise gradually gives way to a far more personal journey of desire, self-discovery and liberation.
When asked what it was like to portray Kris’ pursuit of pleasure and authenticity, Einbinder described the experience in one word.
“I would say incredibly liberating.”
The actor said Kris’ emotional arc mirrored where she found herself during production.
“I feel like I was kind of on a similar journey of self-exploration and introspection as Chris was when we were shooting the movie.”
Einbinder credited Schoenbrun with creating an environment where that vulnerability could flourish through open and deeply personal conversations.
“It did feel incredibly empowering and liberating,” she said. “I accredit that to the work and to the closeness to the character, but also to the conversations that Jane and I had that were very personal and vulnerable and safe. So that was really helpful.”
That sense of trust is woven throughout Camp Miasma. The film doesn’t simply celebrate queer horror. It interrogates it, embraces its contradictions and revels in every bloody, sexy, messy corner of it. It’s a movie that understands horror’s history well enough to challenge it, while still delivering the thrills, romance and outrageous spectacle audiences come for in the first place.
For anyone craving a horror film overflowing with sapphic longing, unforgettable imagery, gallons of blood and a thoughtful exploration of identity, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is one of the year’s essential watches.