22 Sides
22 Sides is a podcast that will let you get to know some fascinating people and keep up with many things that are happening in and around the Houston area.
22 Sides
Camp Miasma Deconstructed
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A slasher that’s obsessed with orgasms, a killer called Ventman, and a theater full of people laughing at totally different moments set us up for one of our most revealing roundtables yet. We’re coming at Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma from different generations and different relationships to horror, and that gap becomes the story: when a movie is built out of references, meta jokes, and genre tropes, who feels invited in and who feels left behind?
We talk through the film’s camp horror DNA, its maximalist symbolism, and the way fandom shapes how you “read” what’s on screen. Then we get into the uncomfortable center: sex, consent, fear, dissociation, and the idea that intimacy can feel like danger, especially for trauma survivors or anyone navigating gray-ace feelings. We also ask why cartoonish gore can feel safer than realistic harm, and how body horror can be both repulsive and strangely empowering when it pushes back on narrow beauty standards.
The hardest turn is representation. Horror has a long history of turning trans and intersex bodies into the twist, the threat, or the punchline, and we unpack what happens when a modern film tries to critique that history while still borrowing its shape. We connect the on-screen choices to real-world dehumanization in media, and we wrestle with the ethics of showing violence without feeding the thrill of it.
If you love queer horror, meta horror, film criticism, and the messy truth of watching together, hit play. After you listen, subscribe, share with a friend who argues about movies, and leave a review. What’s one horror trope you wish would finally die?
We hope you will listen often.
For more information, visit our website 22sides.com
Mic Checks And Puppy Pad Jokes
Alexis Co HostWere you in there talking entire time?
Robin- HostYeah, I think so. Okay, sounds good. Yeah. We'll see. I end up moving a lot. So just like, you need a mic.
KoomahI have I picked the chair with the the arms to like plant yourself. Well, to plant myself because I'm I'm very like all over the place. And so if I can like grab onto this, I can prevent those things from happening.
Alexis Co HostFair. And you know, and one of the main reasons that I moved myself way back here is to prevent Kuma from whopping me.
Robin- HostYeah, good idea. Good idea.
Alexis Co HostI have had that occur, shall we say?
RebeccaAnd you've got the ring, so it's gonna leave a mark room.
Alexis Co HostLook at that. Oh, I love that one. Oh, that's the teeth marks. Phantom nose. Do you want me to hold this? Nope. Okay.
RebeccaNope. I need to know if it's gonna die. Nope.
Alexis Co HostAnd whop me in the face, which it might.
MelAlways a danger in production.
Alexis Co HostWell, but you know, the scars look really good.
RebeccaYeah, true edge.
Alexis Co HostBy the way, we are recording. Oh, okay.
RebeccaOf course we're recording.
Alexis Co HostDid we get the puppy pad?
RebeccaEdit it into the credits.
Alexis Co HostI mean, we could. It would just take a minute or two for someone to run upstairs and pull one.
Robin- HostIt helps my we'll pull it when they sponsor. It helps my puppy pad sponsored by Chewy. My advertis department. Not better health, yeah.
RebeccaNo, no. Dr. Mew. Yeah. Just Chewy.
Alexis Co HostI was gonna say, so if that's the case, we probably should switch you to a chair we're getting rid of.
Speaker 6We need to rear palsy anyway, right?
Alexis Co HostNo, no, that's it.
Speaker 6That one's pretty new.
KoomahYeah, it's these two that we're getting rid of. If I have to clean any more of these chairs electric.
Robin- HostOh, that's very good.
Alexis Co HostAnd then I clean the ones you didn't.
Robin- HostWell, don't act like you don't like the arm-length gloves.
MelIf that happens, I'm sending this directly to Gillian Anderson.
KoomahPlease sponsor us.
RebeccaGillian Anderson. I mean please.
KoomahMel would like to especially request a reenactment of a certain scene.
MelThey, oh my god. Well, I'll wait for the podcast. That's it. Her uterus just explodes. They did a promotional thing, but I'll let I'll wait for the podcast. It's on. We're on it right now. Okay. We aren't again do the introduction.
Alexis Co HostOh, we aren't going to do introductions. It better be, you know, totally anonymous, I think.
Meet The Hosts And Guests
MelYou don't need to know who we are.
Alexis Co HostI'm Alexis. This is 22 Sides. And we have one, two, three, four, five of us tonight. Oh, I have no idea what we're going to talk about or do, but it should be interesting.
Robin- HostWell, we have some repeat guests. We have Kuma and Mel, and you might have heard about them from our ghost episode or uh the intersex episode. But we never got to the good part of the ghost. We can keep it going.
Alexis Co HostYou know, I mean, we we never got to the actual ghost stories episodes. We just generally talked about ghost stories.
Robin- HostWell, we're now in Halloween season. So if you're counting down after the 4th of July, we're definitely on the cusp of Halloween season.
Alexis Co HostSo I I guess we should go around and let everybody introduce themselves briefly.
Robin- HostWell, we c we can't let them not meet Rebecca. She's got to meet Well I know. Okay. Well, I'm Robin Mack. I'm one of the co-hosts. Okay. They know me. Yeah.
Alexis Co HostI'm Alexis again.
RebeccaOkay, go ahead. And so Hi, I'm Rebecca Bernstein, uh actor, director, and artistic director of Zoom Shakespeare Productions here in Houston. And uh happy to be here. Happy to have you.
Robin- HostYeah, thanks for working it out. Mel Lonnie's playing air guitar.
Alexis Co HostSo so for the AI that's going to edit this.
Robin- HostOh no.
Alexis Co HostWhen you get silenced, just give it to Mel.
RebeccaYeah. Uh, I am Mel Peterson, and you are listening to 22 Sides of Horror.
unknownOkay.
MelThat's pretty good. Thank you. That's my EC comics slash Crip Keeper slash creep show intro for this. So and I'm gonna send it on over to Huma.
KoomahBut Mel, you should tell us more about who you are and what you do.
MelI mean, if you haven't been listening to this, that's really your problem. But I guess for those of you just joining us, you may remember me from such things as earlier episodes of this podcast. And also certain queer art performance, media, film, tech in Houston, Texas. So now that you know a little bit about me, and I'm sure you'll know too much more about me going forward, I'm gonna send it over to Kuma.
KoomahAgain. Yes. Hi, everybody. I am Kuma, and I am the co-founder and executive director of the Houston Intersex Society.
Speaker 6Yeah.
KoomahThe uh first and only intersex organization in the state of Texas. I'm also an interdisciplinary artist and um Fashionista?
Robin- HostI mean, well, we could keep going. I would play with rings.
KoomahAnd right now, rings.
Robin- HostEspecially.
KoomahWe're sitting for the rings. My fingers felt naked.
Robin- HostIt's good to dress them up every now and then. Your fingers. I thought we were
Why We Went To This Movie
Robin- Hostgonna talk about it. Yeah.
KoomahWe're working our way towards the nudity.
Robin- HostOkay, so what are we here to talk about?
Alexis Co HostWell, for some strange reason, we were talked into going to a movie. I have no idea what the movie is. After watching it, I have no idea what the movie was. Except I do have some impressions. But I'll save those for after someone else gives theirs because mine are probably going to be a little bit different.
Robin- HostMel, why don't you set the scene? Ooh. Because you curated this wonderful night for us. Oh, it's you have there. Oh, it was definitely Mel's idea.
MelYou poor folks, you're gonna have to listen to me for a good 20 minutes. Okay. All right. Well, let me try and make this brief.
Alexis Co HostUm, you have two minutes left.
Mel20 years left. Um, so we went to go see the opening in Houston, Texas of uh Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma. Sorrying the fabulous Gillian Anderson. If you're listening to this, please sponsor. And also uh Hannah Einbinder. Einbinder, I think it's Einbinder. I'm probably uh terribly abusing her name, but she also gets terribly abused in this film. So but she enjoyed it, so there's that. Um it was consensual, which unlike most horror movies, right? Uh eventually. There was that there that one bit, uh except for that one bit. Um so yes, we watched the movie. It's by uh trans uh female director uh who's an up-and-coming director, has directed um what was it? Uh I saw the TV Glow, a few other projects. So she's really building a name for herself in Hollywood. And this was totally if you're into horror, if you're into cult films genre stuff, you will be spending the entire time being like, I know who that person is, or uh, split diopter shot, you know? And that's exactly how it did.
Alexis Co HostYou spend the entire time laughing.
MelI I did that too, but internally I was also nerding out. I was trying to be aware of my fellow film goers and not scream at the top of my life.
Alexis Co HostBecause you know, it was if you go to the movie, and I'll talk, you know, my sort of quick take on it, which probably isn't anybody else's at all. Um I mean, I don't mind horror movies.
Speaker 6Yeah.
Alexis Co HostBut you know, if you put things in that have absolutely no place in the plot and that they're never connected on either end, I get a little bit bored with it because my mind is like, why was that there? Yeah. And and and you know, that's pretty much the way I saw this whole thing. Yeah. But it was very clearly like a teenager's idea of what a horror movie that has super, super, super sexual overcones should be. And so they threw in all this stuff that's supposedly supposed to create shock, but only created humor if you've been around a little bit.
RebeccaYeah, I think there's definitely something to be said for like her, you know, referencing all of the like overly sexual, trans true transphobic, homophobic films of the 80s and 90s with you know, the oh, the cross-dressing serial killer.
MelAbsolutely. That evil hermaphrodite.
Alexis Co HostYeah, Kuma knows. I've just we have them all sitting on our row.
MelThere you go. We are all in this movie.
Alexis Co HostAnd the I did find it interesting that you know their person who was bringing them to an orgasm was named Little Death.
Speaker 6So we're so we're going French.
Alexis Co HostSymbolism.
KoomahAnd it's like, okay, so we're letting me. I'll just clip it out there, but like I try I tried to watch.
Alexis Co HostWas there any non-obvious thing in this movie?
KoomahNo. Okay, just I tried to watch, like I saw the TV glow like three times. I couldn't make it through. I was just bored as hell.
Speaker 6Thank you.
KoomahAnd the dialogue was terrible, and the characters were just insufferable. I felt similarly about a lot of this movie. Um, and I felt like a lot of the stuff that was supposed to be funny. I knew it was supposed to be funny. I didn't necessarily find it funny. I had a lot of like eye roll moments. It seemed very like trite and like contrived. Uh but I I also understand what they were doing, and I think that it boils down to it's not for me specifically. Because I could hear a male behind me like losing. What I was going to say.
Alexis Co HostYou didn't have the laugh track next to me.
MelYou were setting it right next to me.
KoomahYeah, so and there was there was also yeah, I I'll I'll kind of hand it over before I, you know, kind of talk about it. But I'm very interested on how, like, with how different everyone at this table is, how we kind of perceived it and saw it and and consumed it differently because, like I said, you know, Mel just loved it. Yeah. And I think I had a different experience. I think Alexis had a different experience. And so I'm curious as to how everybody felt about it.
Robin- HostDo you want to say anything more, Rebecca?
RebeccaYeah,
Camp Miasma As Meta Horror
RebeccaI mean, it's one of those movies where you watch them and you're like, I don't know. Like, probably in about a week or I'll message Mel and be like, here's here are my final thoughts. Oh, yeah. But when everything is thrown at you in a movie, and this was a movie where it was like, let's give you everything, let's give you some bizarre, hard to follow symbolism, and some very obvious symbolism, and some comedy, and beautiful painted backdrops. Right, yeah.
Alexis Co HostUm and some flashbacks. But we did we But are they real or are they in the time determine which it was, but it couldn't be the splendid.
RebeccaIt isn't a flashback in the movie within a movie. Or is it a flashback within the movie? The movie was a movie. Oh my god.
Robin- HostThere's a lot of meta to it. Yeah, for sure. For sure. Oh yeah, yeah, meta. Yeah, not mega. Forget that. No, no. But uh, you know, can we please have a night without them? I did I this is the first time I have been at River Oaks movie theater since their remodel, and I really appreciated going back into the space with friends, but I also appreciated when the uh credits came up just to see how many community members there were there. It was a beautiful, um, like unplanned thing to see old friends, new friends, and I love that about movies. I've missed that about movies. I haven't seen a queer film since QFest. And yeah, so I mean that's been a big deal. But I Christian said to me, uh, one of the things he was gonna miss the most about not doing QFest was the familiar community reactions. You know, I mean, it's one thing to go to a film and not know anyone in there. And like Kuma was saying, is this film made for me? I don't know. I'm not gonna laugh at the same things, I'm not gonna feel the same things. But I feel like if I had to guess without serving this particular crowd, some of them were really into horror film, and then some of them just went with their friends like me. Like I would have never actually chosen this film, and I'm really glad I watched it because I sh I stay away from um entertainment that is about trauma. I don't watch trauma for entertainment, so there goes horror, right? But um this was this was a little bit uh a good mix of campy, so it wasn't like too frightening. You know, I was telling Rebecca my last horror film was uh Nightmare on Elm Street, so that was like a while ago. Freddie Cougar, like the whole series, you know. That was way scarier than this. So I was like, oh, okay, I think I can do this. So I kind of kind of felt like I could relax into the movie, and I was really surprised by just how much laughter there was in the film in the movie theater. Yeah, like a lot of different laughs. But I don't know, maybe it's because I don't know horror film. I'm I'm similar to Kuma, like I don't know why people were laughing, but I kind of liked it, you know. But I I wasn't laughing because I'm like, well, I don't really get the jokes, but it was still fun to hear it.
KoomahThere was a lot of like nods and homage to like classic horror films and film tropes. That makes sense. But I think if you're if you're not someone who either like enjoys horror movies or knows a lot about them, that you might miss some of those things.
RebeccaAlso, can we just talk for a second about Ventman being the most ridiculous look and name for his serial yeah little eyes staring out from the vent.
Alexis Co HostI think nickname was Little Death. Same person, yeah.
MelYeah, okay. Yeah, Vent Man is actually pretty funny, though. I like that.
Alexis Co HostWith the spear, with the spear that gets stuck. Every time I saw Ventman, the first thing I thought was, yeah, they did run out of money for that. Or did they run out of creativity? I'm hoping it's money, because you know that can be fixed. Creativity really can't be fixed if you run out of that.
RebeccaBut then, like the Jeepers Creepers monster is also similarly ridiculous. Absolutely. Like, not that scary, but still kind of scary. Yeah.
Robin- HostThey had just enough vent space to be a voyeur, but also to not get splashed by blood if they didn't want to. So that was interesting.
KoomahLike kind of like Resident Evil, video games. Yeah, yeah.
MelI did feel like that. Uh yeah, Resident Evil with big imagery there. Uh anyone who's been to Comic Con.
unknownYeah.
Speaker 6Pointing at Melbourne, yeah.
RebeccaUh for everyone listening. Mel is pointing at Mel Salves. Thank you. I can't believe it.
Alexis Co HostGo up, pull a little chain in the tank every time.
Robin- HostWell, Mel from somebody who actually watches horror, like what did you think? If somebody is a horror buff, would they like this?
MelWell, again, it's really interesting to hear all the perspectives because and we have different generational perspectives too, because this is this movie, uh, and let me reiterate the director's name is Jane Schoenbrunn. I hope hopefully I said her name right. Um I never saw any of the other films that she's done. Like she's done a few of the popular ones, and usually I spoil myself for movies. I'm terrible about that, and that I'll research everything before I even go. But I really made a conscious effort to just go and see this with fresh, as fresh as I can, knowing all the horror tropes and classic films this is referencing and being very familiar with at least one of the main actresses. Um which one would that be? Which one? You know, that'll be discussed later on when we get to the sex scene.
Speaker 6We're going to honorable mention.
MelMel's edging. Oh my god, the car right here. But the tried.
KoomahI mean we already mentioned that Mel should have put a puppy pad down in the theater scene.
MelYou know, no shame because Gillian Anderson is a lot of people's sexual awakening. And I just like to say honorable mention. That is true. That is true. Um, but yes, so back to the movie. Um so yes, I I'm very familiar with a lot of the tropes, but looking at this, just sitting down watching the movie, trying to absorb all the things, because it was like a lot was thrown at you. Yes. Um, if you're not familiar with horror tropes, you would be very lost. Like they literally had to state certain symbolism in there multiple times, and it got to be kind of like a corny joke because the minute you see the trailer, anyone used to old Hollywood movies knows Sunset Boulevard is exactly the symbolism they're going for with uh Gillian Anderson's main character there who's playing the actress who originated the Camp Miasma movie franchise, who kind of got thrown out of it because she was going through traumas too, and couldn't, you know, really get back into the swing. And then by the time she was able to maybe embrace it, um, the studios felt she was too old, you know. And and they have a term for this in Hollywood where a lot of actresses get aged out of the system is unfuckable.
Alexis Co HostUm so yes, it's they were trying to prove that wasn't the case in this movie.
MelAnd it is and it is not. I am exactly that target audience, I would like to say. But not the only one.
Robin- HostThose rose puddles are for me.
MelOh god. I mean, I okay. Can we just talk a second? Okay, the lead up to the sex scene, right? We'll get back to it later. But I know which one. The lead up to the second maybe sex scene was uh candles everywhere. I have this personal thing in movies where if I see a ton of candles all over the place, one did they buy stock in a candle company? Were they the sparks person at some point? Also, fire hazards and the cabin in the woods, yeah. With a lot of old So that's the part of me that's a tech safety person from theater and everything, going, oh my god. So it's like your nervous system is kind of like nervous system goes whatever.
KoomahIt's all together about the rug made out of candy.
MelI mean, that was just fun, but I'm just laughing.
Robin- HostIt's interesting though, because in the movie they're all about trying to create a perfect nervous system for an orgasm. And then you were as a tech person who's who favors these movies, we're like, so like I can't breathe.
MelThat's part of the psychology of horror movies, though. It's kind of like between watching
Tropes, Fandom, And Safe Fear
Mela porn film and watching, like you said, movies that are geared around trauma. And in a way, sometimes those movies are like therapy reenactment because the horror scene, I feel like there's a lot of people who are fan, deep fans of horror, who have been through a lot of traumas in their lives. Like that, you know, sexual trauma, abuse, childhood trauma, um, other things. And it's very interesting to me that Jane, the director, has a lot of these movies focus on fandom. Okay. So they they really center fan experiences of genre stuff. That makes sense and try to examine like a psychological perspective while at the same time making us kind of safe space for reenactment. Because as you notice, with a lot of the murder scenes and stuff, one of the reasons they weren't overdone is we were staring at the killer, not the people being killed. That makes sense. And even with a lot of the sex scenes and stuff.
Alexis Co HostSo I have to say something real quick. Not overdone.
KoomahSo we're getting 40 foot guys, blood geysers. Not overdone by Mel's perspective. Decapitating.
RebeccaThat's what makes me laugh. That's why I was laughing.
MelOh, good point, but there's a Looney Tunes angle to that, right? Because we have actually talked about this before. Uh Kuma is developing a kind of gory film. And we've discussed, okay, violence is acceptable, but when you make it overly cartoony, like, you know, what's uh the mouse and the cat? Tom and Jerry, it de emphasizes the trauma of the thing. That makes sense, yeah. So again, you're talking from how do we make that sense?
Alexis Co HostYou know, like you were talking about the candles. When I see the candles, I'm like, okay, so I hope they've done the fireproofing that they have to do to have that many candles there. So it's this the part I'm always looking at if if I'm working on a shoot or moving or something like that. And then you know when it when it's some of the other stuff, I'm like, okay, I I'm quite sure that that that sphere is, you know, blanked the way it should be, so that it can't possibly penetrate and hopefully certain areas that maybe have something on it. And then you know it it it it's when it comes to things like that and then when they start to do things that it's like, well, we're doing a geyser of blood. The logistics.
KoomahThe logistics have a very overkill.
Alexis Co HostOh yeah. To do it the size they had and the height they had, that's a lot of pressure.
unknownOh yeah.
Alexis Co HostAnd that pressure is really dangerous.
MelSo that is the other process the anxiety points for me came from really weird, stupid, specific things that you'd have to be in a certain area of the industry to experience. It wasn't the death scenes, it wasn't the blood, it wasn't even the a lot of the overtly sexual imagery and stuff because I'm used to seeing that in these generous things. It was actually more the aspects of vulnerability for one, right? A kind of discussion of rape culture and and all that aspect. And then also just the weird tech things where you're just like all these candles you know it's like but I kind of feel they might have anticipated that.
KoomahFelt very much like the horror film for asexuals or like in thinking of things that were successful. Yeah. And coming as like a hypersexual person, I had to kind of you know really put my mind in that place to be like these are people that are hesitant about sexual encounters and that intimacy and like all of those things. And so as far as like we're talking about like that vulnerability is discomfort and that can kind of shift into terror for some people. And so I think that paired with like almost like the fear of of orgasm like you want this thing but you're scared of it and the intimacy the little death all of these things I don't want to die.
MelYeah exactly. And I would say like that's kind of how I would explain it as is very much like a horror film for great A and and again that's the fan angle because a lot of people I've known over the years in fandom and I I started getting into fandom when I was fairly young. I I watched shows like Xena Warrior Princess and X Files and things like that. And so at the same time I'm coming of age you know and discovering myself in a lot of ways but still very closeted in a lot of ways until you find your community you're going through this like you're always trying to put yourself in someone else's shoes. Like legit and this is the part Gillian Anderson said listen to um early on in my youth I did in fact have an X Files inspired sex stream and I was this was before I even realized I was gay right do tell I'm literally this is the thing right is like you don't think about who you're focusing on in the dream necessarily but when you examine it later in life you're like oh yeah I put myself in the character of Fox Mulder because that was the romance set up in the show and I was focused on her. So when I was young I didn't quite connect that yet but these were the building blocks of like oh wait think about this you don't talk about guys with other girls and stuff you don't and you have obsessions with like male iconography and everything too so your gender is in shift and your sexuality is in shift a lot of people in fandom especially a lot of the trans fan community found their spaces in these online groups and these these collectives to where they could put themselves in the shoes of other people on screen and in in fandom before they could have that in real life. So I kind of understand where she's getting that emphasis and symbolism from definitely I I think that even like when you're talking about fandom how that expands to things like cosplay and role playing games.
KoomahOh yeah no for real because people are able to like or even like we talk like BDSM community that do puppy play or pony play under a you have this like this persona this person that you can be and even to some extent like as a performer when when people do drag they have a drag performer yeah you can be a totally different person on stage you know burlesque performers you could have this like whole chemistry of romance on stage and then all of a sudden when you go home you're like oh I'm not that person.
Robin- HostThat's me on stage that's not that's not me in the Honda.
KoomahThat's me on on the stage you know you're able to like live vicariously through these already established characters that are the traits that you would like yourself to be but are maybe a little hesitant or that's not one of the things Mel you mentioned that you sort of came of age at the same time as like Zena and some of those things.
Alexis Co HostWell the other thing is if you'd already sort of figured out that this is who you are, these were just great expert things.
RebeccaOh yeah oh yeah absolutely I was lucky enough to go to uh Carson California earlier this summer for the 10th annual Homeout Con which is a Buffy the Vampire Slayer convention there you go um which is a beautifully clear community and and neurodivergent fan community but it does get back to um and I think there were actually straight up Buffy references in I Saw the TV glow. Sure. So much so that like the text in the show within the movie I saw the TV glow was the text in Buffy. Yeah there you go. But like the fact that it was you know that that weekend that I was there was you know maybe 400 500 people from all over the world who were all dressed up and you know there was something to be said for being so connected to a fandom that you almost want to live inside of it.
MelAbsolutely and I think it was it has been safe spaces for people who really like live in small rural communities who don't have this connection in their lives. A lot of stories I've heard from people online coming through these fandom lives Buffy and X Files and Xena and all these things was a lot of stories of like I I never had any community around me and so I got to role play online and find these groups and find my my tribe right um in ways that you couldn't in person until you start traveling to conventions and being in these moments. So it is very much like you know it's the new age techie version of back in the day with zines and books and secret clubs and meetups and movie houses. So that's how a lot of people connected so I think it really is like a you know how you have nostalgia films so much of the time for like old content.
KoomahI really think this is like the internet age groups nostalgia film for like hey remember that time where you were growing up and I would say on the the flip side of that one of the other things that this film did sort of uh hold up of a mirror to and I'll kind of point this to Alexis to talk about as well is that feeling as uh like a trans or gender diverse person or for myself like as an intersex person seeing older films or even I mean for some of us these were you know films that we were watching in real time where the trans person or the intersex person is the killer, is the psycho is the villain and like what does that feel like but also the ways that this movie kind of addressed that and and yeah anyway address that were you getting no I just well I'll I'll let you walk into that and we can we can uh talk about it more it's gonna slip over into UFOs I can tell. Oh I hope so I mean Gillian Anderson who has age like fine warning the big thing about it is once again for me you can't do stupid things that have no connection I mean you know I'll give you one or two maybe three you know where I'll think about it let it you know do a logical leak a big one but after four I'm not even there anymore it's like I'm sorry you need to do your work brighter if you are gonna do your work why should I sit here and watch this stuff yeah and and that that's where to me a lot of the um oh slash removing like I don't do zombie movies because I'm like they don't walk fast leave that's the funny bit because you know and and you know and it's like we take a double barrel shotgun to zombies knowing we have two shots the friggin' machining it doesn't ever worth you know move so much had a bunch of treadmills facing forger property exactly and then they're fine they'll never get there's got this vision of a zombie just on a treadmill brains brains where are the brains I literally saw that movie though it was in the 15 so kind of going back to what I was saying I so like I have uh recently been revisiting the Tales from the Crypt series and so like there's an episode there's actually a couple of episodes one uh where you know it's like oh the crazy guy killer is you know is his own he has an argument with his wife and then it turns out it's him and Drake right or there was another one where it's like this assassin person and it you know oh it's your husband and we know it's we know it's him and it turns out it's it's her and she you know had a six change or whatever and then it's the it's either the like yeah the crazy killer or like the secret twist ending and like even knowing that those are what like 20 30 years old yeah yeah like that's fine and they feel new again because they haven't seen them in so long and it still is just like God for real well like one of the I was like it's her she's the guy I know it's that's one of those things that at least with me and I'm sure you did the same thing the minute it starts to do anything where that's going to end up where we're going to end up I I I can go to the bathroom.
Alexis Co HostYou can clock it. You know it. It's just it's just there.
Robin- HostI think it was interesting that we were
Sex, Violence, And Power
Robin- Hostwalking in and as it happens we were talking about but I'm a cheerleader and how it's a timeless cult film in itself and how that is kind of loosely based around a camp growing up becoming of age and how to assimilate the the the right perfect sex and to to you know basically code switch to be approved of right and then you have this film as it turns out I just saw some of the like the similar story themes. So you know it talks about where the original camp scene the girl wasn't empowered even the guys like trying to talk her into something in that's like a shot where you know but you'll like this better. I mean it's just real cheesy and and probably how a lot of women specifically in general have to disassociate once they get into a sexual experience because they realize they can't get out of it. So the thing they can do is go to a place in their mind. Yeah. And I think a lot of people can relate to that.
Alexis Co HostYeah and that's why you carry a big knife in your backpack. Right.
KoomahYou are the killer in the report I fist misogynists. Yeah I fist misogynists can I bumper sticker there you go because that's that's maybe the best quote I've heard in a while well and I I in in the in the movie though uh Gillian Anderson Gillian or Gillian?
Robin- HostHow do you say it? Uh Gillian Gillian Gillian is trying to train which a lot of us would find arousing in the like femme femme sense but she's trying to train and lead uh the uh other lady Hannah Chris in the movie yeah I am yeah in in how to have that association where she's empowered and then the trans character I find obviously like highly questionable but they went from a bullying situation to basically curating and re-bullying or re-murdering you know almost like a part of a poly uh addition to their sex scene and so they were also similarly empowered at the end of the at the end of the movie. But I these people in real life are walking around talking about female and queer empowerment in their lives and then they're using this film to be a talking piece. And I think this will be like the new um coming of age campy film where we use it as a talking piece like we did but I'm a cheerleader for so many years. You know I mean and I I think this is where straight cis het women don't have the language that queer poly, you know, neurodivergent people kind of do. And so it's like adding the the the feelings the language the context with a laceover of gore and flesh you know I mean because I like again I don't watch a lot of horror films but mainly this whole thing was centered around how to be empowered during a sex scene. Am I wrong? I mean like they weren't like how to christen this camp or how to get the the hauntedness off of it or how to move on it was all like how to finally orgasm and be an experience of that. Yeah.
Alexis Co HostBut the big thing about it is everything in this movie and how to be empowered by sex flame and you know how to get an orgasm would seem to take a really long time. Well she's just bragging most people there are still some people that don't have orgasms and then you know but the big thing about it is that every bit of what they did was what we generally consider a little bit questionable. Okay unless I not something I don't like but you know everything we had lots of blood we had lots of pain we had lots of killing people you know to get an organ I don't know about you Alexis but I just like exactly unlike you got to be careful because if you kill them all off left again I mean the spear was practically knife play I mean what's the problem?
KoomahSo I think that symbolism also like you know the word that was used a lot was for both sex and violence was penetrating. Right? And so there's that symbolism there too like there's a reason that he stabbed people with a spear and didn't bludgeon them to death with like a hockey stick right and he you know kept stabbing them for you it was you know and beheading too because there was some there was some head action going on.
MelYeah that's why the vampire trope has lasted a lot of there you goes the vampire do it penetrates I just also want to put out there uh the chicken eating um sexy sexy chicken sauce okay yes yes so there is a place for the ASMR foodies that if you're if you are a place like me of the movie Kumpel and you like a little food play yes uh oh just uh find a uh find a rip of just that chicken scene yeah I think you're welcome yes you are welcome in and watching it come off the bottom in the sounds it's that like the SMR yeah chicken chicken strip dunking button it doesn't just jump into it though like it it it builds into it it starts with the nail on the dipping stones like you get to so much chicken like it's too much cancelled I mean to sponsorship alone I mean the product that was also I was keeping track in the mind of of like product placement oh yeah coke what's in there Kit Kat the Kit Katummi the all the thing there were shopping aisle scenes that way honestly went on longer sometimes than the death or sex scene I am you're just like I really want you to know the kind of the the kind of snacks I eat I was not the only one that thought like period play at the end oh yeah totally you were you were not the only you were not the only one the red wings definitely carry carry blood soak I'm wandering into town getting definitely carrying the like post sex and your face is covered in blood like I know what that is a shout out to the to the uh cash register uh extra who really did your job like you were she was my favorite character yes like uh also uh I'm glad that Kevin McDonald is still working oh my god yes bless his little kids in the hard hall kids in the hall again all the movie filled with I know who that is I know who that is you know this was like again what walking through young people in the early 90s and so growing up watching all the cult classics like you know kids in the hall and the horror films and all that yeah when when when I was sitting there there's one point that I think Rebecca you found something really funny and I'm like I have no idea when that was funny.
Alexis Co HostI don't remember when that was oh there was a lot there were a few laughs but I was sitting there and then I started like You have arrived. Yeah well that was hilarious laughter relatedness you have arrived yeah but I flashed to Rocky horror and you know the the song and all of the movies that were in the song that if you knew about them yeah I still see the scenes when they're coming on absolutely when that goes through and I'm like yeah okay so they're doing sort of that bit with it yeah and there's kind of over the top blood play with Rocky too when he goes a little nutty on meatloaf and stuff.
KoomahI will also say and I don't know if anybody at this table has seen it but there at least in my opinion was a strong nod to the Japanese movie R100.
RebeccaOkay.
KoomahI think I showed we watched them together yeah and in in that film it it's kind of this blurred line between orgasm and um like getting getting high on drugs like a drug addiction and like SM and in in the film it's this like businessman and his wife uh is has like cancer he's trying to take care of his younger son he's like a salesman um and he joins a like a SM club where like a hundred dominatrixes will just pop up one at a time. Well one at a time right now and then um and just beat the ever loving shit out of him. And so the way that like the director talked about yeah he gets and there's a sound in that film that they used in this film. Yeah. Um this like I can't even mimic it but there's a very distinct sound and it's this like in the film it's it's both him like uh feeling fulfillment whether that's orgasm but the the director was also saying that it's left kind of blurred of like is the he really in this like SM club or is it like is he using drugs and this is like a right a nod to him uh getting high or is this something else kind of thing?
Alexis Co HostWhat's the difference?
KoomahChemically not a whole lot in real life a good SM club and drugs or and it it also has that like um I don't know if you're familiar with like absurdist Asian cinema kind of kind of you know bits to it. So I was thinking a lot about R100 when I was watching this and especially I think it was that sound that like you know triggered that for me.
MelOh yeah but no I I fell I found that too like most things in the western culture we often steal a lot from Japanese culture and then pretend but we didn't but and and hope you don't notice until later on when you actually research it. But you know if I listen everything you know we're all thinking this really should have been X rated in C 17 I didn't see any genitals that's important well to be honest um okay I didn't grow up like everyone else did but I don't know to me this Is really on like the more vanilla side of it. Yeah, yeah.
KoomahYou didn't really see anything.
MelIn that Japanese film, yeah, I could see where they would have a few things. I don't, I wouldn't, but then I'm not part of the censorship board. I'm actively against it.
Alexis Co HostSo you know, I don't think anything should be X-rated.
MelWell, there you go. I know it's like if you're worried about it Well, and really X the X-rating thing, as anyone who's seen that documentary would know, it's really a punishment against artists to don't do this. Oh, we said don't do this, and you're it's so we're gonna make it harder for you to get in movie theaters to make money to continue your career because you did that thing we said that you shouldn't do. And that could be, oh, you showed trans representation, you showed LGBT, you showed a sex scene where a woman actually enjoyed herself instead of being insulted. Yeah.
Alexis Co HostAnd you know, the real scary day, the real scary thing is that these days you can talk about a particular politician the wrong way and you'll get x-rated.
Robin- HostYeah. Well, and there were there were drugs in it, and there were drugs with sex in it. And I think that it it's I mean, one could argue their sugar high might have been a little bit like higher than their marijuana high, you know.
KoomahI mean, I would also say the most graphic as far as like genitals that ever appeared was that weird VHS flesh wall vagina.
MelYeah, oh God hated it. That's true. Shout out to Cronenberg. Yeah, it did.
KoomahIt felt very Cronenberg.
MelAnd was it Videodrome 2? Body horror was an aspect of this. But again, going back to that, what do you find empowering at horror movies? I always kind of found body horror empowering. That's why some of my favorite horror filmmakers
Gender Expression As Fantasy
Melbecause it's always, and again, you come of age in these eras where there's very specific, idealized body types, right? And I've never found traditional body types to really be that arousy. I've always liked unique looks, unique bodies. I don't think you're alone in that.
Robin- HostAnd I think I think this film does speak to those people.
MelYou know, I mean, the kind of the joke in some porno movies is that uh allow straight porn features really fugly guys with dessert, and I mean it kind of works better for me because I'm like, well, at least I'm not watching like Transformers over here where you can see the shine on a bicep or something and it looks like a Mercedes. I don't know.
KoomahI think one of the things that I also thought was interesting in regards to not necessarily like uh transness, but more so just like gender expression, was we see at one point when the character like comes out and like very like consciously is like, I'm gonna make a move on Gillian Anderson and is like topless but wearing boxer shorts. And so it it you know, but like that is the thing that makes them feel sexy in the moment, yeah, right, and like makes them feel great, but when they're engaging in this play and like talking through like what is your your fantasy kind of whatever, and they talk about like I kind of want to be the last girl in my panties, like running with my big tits flopping around, and then a little bit later we we see that, and like that is definitely like gender expression play, yeah, right, in that if this is who you are all the time, right? Maybe you are a little soft butch and you like to flannel. Yeah, with your flannel and your and your boxer shorts, yeah. But like if you feel sexy, like being the you know little white bikini panties and and running with your boobs flopping, like that's valid too, right? Like that's what gets you off, that's what gets you off. And I I think very specifically for me, it's interesting to see that presented uh in that way. Um, because I I think if this were like a cis man, right, the same sort of thing would be really shamed. Like, and so to see like how that's different in like uh like a lesbian queer space versus like if it was like a gay man that was like you know, kind of butch and then like, oh, I get off on wearing lingerie, society doesn't necessarily accept that as much as like this film. And so I was thinking about that a little bit too, the way like even though this film kind of addressed um depictions of of uh like transness and and stuff like that uh historically, I I was still thinking about like how that felt like watching like a lesbian do that sort of presentation, and then thinking like, would that work if it was the other way around?
MelWell, and again, they
Representation Versus Studio Formulas
Meladdressed some things and some classic homophobia, transphobia tropes and things of the genera in this. I'm not sure they did it necessarily well. I'm not sure. I honestly, you know, I think yes, they did try to do it. I don't disagree. Right. They did try to address it. That's where I was like, it's questionable. I think they were, but like you said, there were moments where it felt like if this was like a whole and maybe this metatextual argument was actually in the movie because the filmmaker in the movie, the young Angeny there, is literally always fighting with the studio execs is like, oh no, I want to do this thing and this perspective, and they're like, well, that doesn't make money. We can't profit from that. We can't, how do you even market that, right? Right, which is all the time.
Robin- HostAnd it's like, is it even a horror film if a woman's not running away, damsel in distress, boobs banging all over the wind in high heels? Like, that's not practical that anyone can ever run that far. The studio exec every goddamn scene is like it has to be in there. Exactly.
MelBut that's the perspective of Studio X now, too. Is like they still want to use the same tropes of the genre. They just want someone who's like more enlightened, more of the community to come in and re-evaluate it and make it meta-technical. And she even says that in the movie.
Robin- HostShe says that in the movie, she's foreshadowing, like she's foreshadowing what the director actually did.
KoomahI very much appreciate the studio exec screaming, what the fuck was that? Yeah, but that's how I felt. Totally, totally.
Robin- HostTotally. But I think I think Kuma's right. Like, if it was a gay man being walked through his his fantasy of a person he couldn't be that gets him off. And let's say he's this like frail twink, and then all of a sudden he sees himself as this masculine bear running to save the day, the film wouldn't have had the same um twist because I think a lot of us are very conditioned to seeing that damsel in distress, that that like half-nude woman. And it's you know, is it a horror film, you know? And or even the cis guy that's like talking the girl into losing her virginity when those bedpost notches, we we all thought that those were his and his buddies, right? And then at the end, the twist is like the um little death, you know, goes and puts it on there, you know. And but I I think like that's where I'm looking at they literally took the time to walk out how she wasn't able to be that intimate. She told her verbally, and then they showed, like, okay, this is how like an intimate moment kind of gets fumbled a little bit, and you and Jillian's like, hey, let's just make tea instead, let's have some wars instead. Like, we don't have to have sex right now. And then it's like, okay, let's come back and actually talk about the dialogue of like who do you have to be like to be able to get there? And I'm not gonna judge you. In fact, I'm gonna facilitate that. And the next thing you know, like not only does she facilitate that, like she ends up going like over the top with like candles and roses and saute, like or sade, right? So like that was shot. That was the blood. So much blood, right? So much blood. And and she walks her through that whole thing. I mean, as a trauma survivor, I think I talk to a lot of people that have been in similar moments and they they do stop themselves. They do pull themselves back. They do believe that the facilitator of whoever they'll be intimate with can't walk them there. And they do that through this whole movie. And I think I hope that like people will find themselves in like sort of like that gray ace area of like not feeling ashamed of not being able to be that type of person that can just like bang it out, put another notch on the bed, and then we're all like, I don't know, go into camp to get our first fuck experience, you know, because that's also a Hollywood trope, is like, oh, coming of age, that's where we get our fuck on, right?
Alexis Co HostThat's what I was gonna mention earlier, you know, when you talked about the camp and the drilling. How many horror movies that were like teenage horror movies and it's the damsel in disgrace thing, you know, that didn't occur at a camp.
KoomahRight. How wait, how many people at this table actually went to camp?
Robin- HostYeah, I did not.
KoomahWas your camp anything like No, are you kidding me?
MelB-I-N-G-O. And his name was Bingo.
KoomahUh Alexis is like, yeah, I might have fucked a few people.
RebeccaNo, no.
KoomahOh I I had to I was forcibly made to go to church camp and it wasn't fun.
Alexis Co HostIt was forcibly made to go to church camp, and that's when I found out about things that I really wish I hadn't found out about.
KoomahThat happens also.
RebeccaYeah, there was there's no no fun experiences of that type at Green Family Camp, which is a Texas Jewish summer camp. Yeah.
MelUm, although I have heard stories from others about isn't it always the story, though? And you always wonder, okay, are they just making this up to make the camp for the wheel? I wasn't seeing any of that.
Speaker 6You know?
KoomahUnlike in the the trans character in the movie, I was not allowed to spend part-time in the boys' wing and part-time in the girls' ring. I had to sleep on the couch in the middle section.
Robin- HostOh
The Trans Character And Old Tropes
Robin- Hostyeah. Well, let's talk about it. Like, what did you think of that trans character? Because I, you know, they obviously highlighted this is the this is the transphobic part of the film.
RebeccaLiterally said that.
Robin- HostYou know, the the person was sort of like gender flexible and then also definitely verbally traumatized by their parents, like the way the camp story went, the origin story.
KoomahI mean, it was very, very specifically a nod to sleepaway camp. Yes, okay. Which if you haven't, if you haven't seen it. I haven't. Okay.
MelThere is so it's the crying game of form. Yeah.
KoomahSo there's like a girl camper that goes there, there's a killer, and you find out at the very end, like she's standing there naked and she has a penis.
RebeccaOh. Which in the 80s, I guess, horrifying.
KoomahRight. But there were a lot of films at the time where like the killer was trans or was like a cross-dresser.
Robin- HostOkay, I wouldn't know that. Okay.
KoomahYou know, and kind of same thing. Like they they talked about, oh, well, this person was like gender fluid, but their parents were hermaphrodites. So you had the same thing where uh, you know, it would be the twist where the intersex the person was really intersex, you know, kind of thing, and that's why they were a killer, or they would change genders. I see. And so it was a kind of a nod to very specifically like the 80s when that was like a trope, it was a thing. Wow.
Alexis Co HostAnd that actually took a lot of effort to defend against. Oh, yeah. And I mean for our community.
KoomahOh, definitely. Because we were either the killers or we were like the dead hooker, and that was it.
Robin- HostWell, and I I think also it just like lends itself into people getting away with their whole um scared tactics, you know, where a lot of straight guys were like, Oh, I was scared, I didn't know she was trans, so therefore my my fear, yeah, yeah, therefore my fear was justifiable and caused harm, and he gets off about it.
KoomahAnd so the I mean, and we talked about like Hayes code and stuff like that, like the reason that, you know, um villains, even like in Disney films, they typically have a foreign accent. They're usually like queer-coded, yeah, right, because it is to present queerness as a villain, as it makes sense, yeah.
Alexis Co HostForeignness wants to be a different thing. Right, same thing. I mean, and and anyone who's not like quote us, of course, none of us, I suspect, is like right. The the people that are the quote us, I mean the standard the majority, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
KoomahBut it was the way to instill that fear of yeah, there you go.
Robin- HostYeah. That's still very present, I think. I'm glad you walked that out because uh, you know, I'm not I haven't seen a lot of horror films, but I could definitely see that.
MelWell, and it was it wasn't even just horror films, because again, when you're trying when you're trying to isolate any community and other them, like dehumanization, it's in everything that's in the news, it's in um the because the news had stories like that too.
Dehumanization Beyond The Screen
MelThey would emphasize certain stories over just reporting okay, everybody has like incidents.
Alexis Co HostQuite a few years here in Houston, we fought with the police and the newspapers about how they reported translates. Because it was not pleasant. Now, you know, yeah, we've pretty much won that locally, yeah, but naturally you still see it pop right. Yep. And a lot of times it it has to do with communities that are not big cities. The big cities have sort of given up because we tend to attack them very heavily when they do that. But you know, the the small communities are like, well, it's and they just you know start going on about what this person was and and that whole bit. It's like you know, you have no way of knowing that.
KoomahAnd there was that whole like just like constant thing around the campfire where they're like, what a freak show, what a freak kind of thing. And it was like, yeah, they kind of did say that in like everyone.
MelWell, and I think that was part of and and so that specific scene, the flashback scene, right? Where you have your traditional camp around the campfire story of the horror that happened 10 years ago, right?
KoomahUm on this very night.
MelYeah, trope of horror movies. So they kept shifting between tropes of different things. So you started with the trope of the horror movie going in literally the characters watching a movie within the movie, and the one director keeps pointing out things like flip dialogue, but then they also point out this is the transphobic bit, and uh Gillian Anderson's character says, Shut up and just watch the movie. But it's like because we know, right? We already know there, except for that one bit, you know. So you're going into it, and then they use this very offensive language. It was basically a trigger warning. It would they use that. They definitely gave trigger warnings too. Offensive historical language that a lot of regular people use over and over in the news or in your friend circles or in high school or whatever else. And they describe, you know, this supposedly real life trauma story, which, you know, who knows how much it's been exaggerated since then, but it sounds like a Fox News talking piece where it's like, oh, these parents, you know, they kept changing their kids' gender every day. It's like it really did sound like Fox News. Yeah, yeah. I definitely heard that on Fox News somewhere. Like among the Haitians eating cats somewhere in the bat.
Alexis Co HostYou know, exactly. So again, it's like the hatred eating cats came after the Vietnamese Vietnamese were eating cats.
MelThat's true, you know, historically. Watch The Simpsons. You know, so it's like so again, you're shifting between all these metatextual tropes, right? You you have the horror movie tropes, you have real life tropes, which people have lived through and had to like fight and interface. And then you have, and I think in a certain respect, this whole movie was meant to like put a mirror up to the audience and all of us in society and be like, hey, we've done these things.
KoomahYeah, we've absolutely there is a way that that reflects reality too, because in that story, right, they're talking about, oh, they had hermaphrodite parents, and the mom was dressed as the dad, and the dad was dressed as the mom, and this person was, you know, on these days they were a girl, and on these days they were a boy, and they came to the lake wearing a bikini. And it not only shows like the other campers like harassing them, but the line, what they say is that they drowned him because they had to.
Speaker 6Yeah, yeah.
KoomahAnd that was the thing that like of anything else in this movie, like felt very real. Yeah, yes, because like we still experience that violence and people feel like it's justified because of our either our anatomy or because of our gender orientation, gender expression, right? Like it's that line, although it's like it sounds so extreme and almost funny, right? Yeah.
Robin- HostBecause the way they say it is like they had to spoofing around the fire, but but the way it really landed, and I'm I was with you on that one. It gives me goosebumps. It's like, and but I think it's what Mel was saying is like it it's also done in a certain way so we can all examine, like, yeah, you know, how many cis dudes have been around a circle and picked on the weak one, you know, how many cis women have, you know, talked the fugly girl out of the circle or whatever, whatever, you know, and and it's like a mirror to look at those things. And and I mean, now in the world we have so many different layers of culture and different transitioning and different like progressive parenting versus conservative parenting. Like there's a lot going on right now, you know. I mean, there's a lot of non-binary kids that are being stunted and being able to grow up. Can they go to the camps with people? Can they not? Do they have to go to their special queer family camp? I don't know. You know, I mean, people are dealing with that in real time. And as much as people want to take something back to, I don't know what decade they're going for, there were people already progressing and having uh very fluid families. And so now we're gonna have to look at that if we will. But but I think it was a good lens to kind of like stop and go, oh yeah, I think I think we all could have a place in those films.
KoomahUh also the very end when you have uh two lesbians, one in her underpants, covered in blood, iconic, coming out of like a grocery store holding hands, and kids are just like squirting each other with squirt guns, like they don't even care. Like the most normal thing in the world. Yeah, right. I think kind of hits the flip side of the like gender panic.
MelYou're right, you're right. Yeah, the the imaginary world we could have, right? And then they can rinse them off.
Alexis Co HostRight, right. I mean I kept expecting to see you know the hose rinse.
Robin- HostAnd back to the cashier getting a compliment about her hair, you know.
MelI mean the cashier. You will love, you will laugh, you will cry. You'll want her phone number. Girl, I know I've stood at that cashier, too. No, but I'll I'll say one last heavy thing because then I think we should get into slightly more
Depicting Trauma Without Exploitation
Mellight-hearted criticisms before. But uh, so it reminded me a lot too of this other film that came to Houston. This is why, like you mentioned earlier, film festivals, you never know what you're gonna see. Um Q Fest, I sat through whole films that were so many different things. Two guys fucking each other across a beach with poetic background, you know, musings. Um was that Derek Jarman? Um Derek Jarman did a lot of those. Oh my god, there was another German one. Oh, some of our uh relatives are still scarred.
KoomahBut that was the armpit licking.
MelUh no, that wasn't that one.
KoomahOh, the one where they were like hitting each other with the nettles.
MelUh I think maybe. That one. Yeah. You have to be there.
KoomahJennifer is still scarred.
MelJennifer's still scarred. But oh shit. Anyway, um, there so film festivals, and you never know what you're gonna get. This one film came to Houston during the black media summit for one of our festivals, and um it was a film about the history of lynching. And so it was done by a first-time female filmmaker. It was a documentary, and we had a talk with her before we even saw the film. And she was very careful to emphasize that when she did the film, it took her like 10 years. She started actually on a theater troupe that did reenactments in the South of lynch, actual lynching cases because to teach the history so it never happens again. So it's like they started with an all-black ensemble, and then slowly more Caucasians started to join. And a lot of the Caucasians were children of parents who used to take them to lynching picnics. So they grew up with this internalized trauma of watching their parents become these murderers before their eyes, and then going home and being like, Oh, here, let's make you a sandwich, you know? So it's like that duality. But they were very passionate about like, no, I'm doing this for the theater group because I believe that we should never return here, right? Because it needs to be done. Wow. So she started with the theater group. And then there was a crime in a near a little bit of a nearby town of a young man who was found in a tree. And the cops said it, well, of course, it's suicide, right? So it's like they didn't even investigate all this stuff. She pivoted to start investigating that. The parents were arguing with the cops. There was another crime. They started so she started with a theater reenactment of history. And then went into true crime happening around us at the same time. Wow. And to tie it all together, she showed pictures pictures of old uh lynching picnics. Right. But she said, I was very careful not to show the actual body in any visible way. I showed the expressions on the people's faces as they were watching this. And a lot were really smiling and they were enjoying things. Like your go-to Fourth of July party, right? Wow. Kids, adults, all these things. She wanted the audience to acknowledge the horror of the experience while not re-traumatizing that section of society and having to see violence visited on like here's a mirror to the people who are doing it, not necessarily traumatizing people that already suffered.
Alexis Co HostIt sounds like she was being careful with is you have to be careful that you don't create an excitement.
RebeccaOh, yes. Absolutely.
Alexis Co HostSo start to see it acted out.
RebeccaAbsolutely.
MelThat's definitely a bold job theater. Well, and I again it's like violence in a lot of horror movies is reenactment and it's also exciting. A lot of violence is depicted. A lot of traditional like violation scenes in movies are depicted in a sexualized, exciting way. There's like one French film that really combated that in the beginning of their movie, There is an Assault, and they they focused on her, on her pain, on everything, and they drew it out so long that the audience started leaving the theater. And this was actually the driver's intent. Uh-huh. He even played a low-level audio signal that is designed to irritate.
KoomahIt makes you nauseous, actually.
MelAnd the director said, My goal was to have people walk out of the theater. I wanted them to leave because this is a horrible story. Right. We should not reenact this trauma. So again, there's this artistic angle, but also this very human examination now of all these genres and things where we're going back in, and part of the film analysis, part of the meta-textual reference is how can we show this and learn a lesson
Slasher Craft And Why Psycho Works
Melwithout re-traumatizing ourselves? How do we do the reenactment therapy without hurting ourselves?
KoomahSo one of the things also, right, and I think you know, you you had kind of briefly mentioned the thing that I'm writing.
Speaker 6Yeah, yeah.
KoomahUm, and it kind of made me think of this, and it's that who in the film that gets killed by the the Ventman were you really upset that they got killed? Which of the people were not unlikable?
Alexis Co HostWell, they they never developed any connection. Exactly.
KoomahRight.
Alexis Co HostWe didn't, yeah.
KoomahRight. And so I think there's there's something to be said there. Uh I think sometimes when we do we do see these like, especially older slasher films, you get this like character development where you make a connection to this character about them and then like oh they get killed, and you're like, But here, like they were either obnoxious or they were just like a face. You know, so you didn't really feel bad about it. Yeah. I was really hoping that one uh gross guy that was pressuring her into sex would just get stabbed through the head.
Alexis Co HostJust just because. Just because.
MelWell, her partner seemed cool. Yeah. That was made me go, oh, I honestly, yeah, I'm with you on that a little bit. Also, I recognized the actress. She's in another horror movie franchise, Scream. She plays the BIPOC daughter of one of the original movie casts who didn't come back for the remakes and stuff, and she's like the investigative reporter, and she's kind of bitchy in those movies, but also she's kind of like, oh, yeah.
KoomahEven like the character's girlfriend and the girlfriend's boyfriend, right? Like when they got killed, you weren't like, oh no. It was just kind of like you were like, oh, yeah, and then when the when the guy gets it, you're kind of like, yeah.
MelOh yeah.
KoomahHe is real unlikable.
MelThat's another trope, though, is like, okay, I'm gonna make these characters so unlikable, no one's gonna care, or or criticize me in in endless notes and letters to the studio that I think late 80s, mid-80s, there were some pseudo-horror films, and in the first two or three minutes, you already found all people are gonna die because they made them just horrible at the first you know, two or three minutes.
Alexis Co HostYou were with you can relax, go to the translation stand, do whatever you need, because you know who's gonna die.
KoomahAnd I think the discussion of psycho was interesting also. Yeah, not just the kind of uh shower curtain. Yeah, that whole thing about like psycho from the point of view of the shower curtain, which is hilarious and totally like 12 people's student films.
RebeccaOh, yeah, yes, you did.
KoomahBut if you know about Psycho, like when Psycho came out, it totally flipped like the horror movie genre on its head because it spent a good you know 30 minutes developing this character that you think is like the main character, only to kill her off and this like traumatic thing, and then the movie goes a direction that nobody was expecting.
RebeccaYeah, but it's genuinely scary, too.
KoomahBut it's one of those things of like if you know the thing about psycho, you can never have that true experience of seeing it. True. Whereas like the folks that saw it when it came out, like mind blown. Yeah, but by the time you see it, like whether it's in the 80s or 90s or now, if you've never seen it, you already know you know what the twist, whatever is. Oh, yeah. You already know what's gonna happen in the shower. It's so iconic that you can never truly experience that like psycho moment.
Alexis Co HostIf they watch it now, haven't really and well, part of the problem is a lot of TVs don't present it well. They haven't really experienced you know Hitchcock's flash. Uh you know, the red flash. And I I've heard people totally 100% surprised by just how much it affected them because they're oh yeah.
KoomahWhat he did it, but also, you know, one of the things too, because I've I've watch movies from everywhere at all time periods, I recently revisited uh Sun Like at Hog. And so to see to see the way that like cross-dressing and and even like you know, that iconic ending, and thinking about like the shift to like how we talked about like transness and queerness in horror movies in like the 80s, how between that time and like that, what that shift, where did that come from? How did that happen? Yeah, and then to see kind of like where we are now, where we started to get like really great trans and like gender fluid and and queer representation, and then suddenly we get that like pendulum swing backwards.
MelSo I actually that's a great segue
Theatre, Casting, And Where It Goes
Melinto what Rebecca does because uh Do tell us about it, Rebecca. Rebecca, the kind of stories Rebecca produces.
Alexis Co HostI suggest we hang down off of our hill here. We take about four or five minutes.
Robin- HostOkay, take a pause and we'll come back. Also, uh gotta take a puppy pad break.
KoomahAlso, are you or are you gonna tell us later? I was gonna ask you a question about like how can we get involved in Zoom Shakespeare, but should I wait? Are you gonna are you gonna talk about that? Yes, yeah, okay. That's what I want to do.
MelWe'll come back to that. Because we gotta dig into the history of Shakespeare and gender expressions that stuff, you know. Oh, we all know all that.
RebeccaOh yeah. And the thing that it's for the young the fact that people very often, I mean, it gets back to the whole like classical text thing, and like people people see these stories the same way a hundred times. And uh hello, hello, yeah.
MelThat doesn't work anymore. Time isn't just a linear progression.
KoomahWe saw um what was it, Taming of the Shrew, but it's said in like 1950s.
MelOh yeah, you saw that classical. Yeah, and uh one of my mom's favorite Shakespeare ones is uh Twelfth Night, which is the basically the actual textual Shakespearean like cross-dressing in a cleaner. We had a couple, but yeah, it's so. We had a lot, but yeah, she that's one of her favorites. Yeah, and so we've seen like multiple. I like her a lot.
KoomahI do like Othello.
MelYeah, I I honestly really like Othello. I even like some of the more, except for that, yeah.
KoomahExcept for one part.
RebeccaWhen it's done well, it can bring him home. When it's not done well, like the classical theater did it, and uh our good friend um Snow, who was our tibble in the world.
MelOh yeah, who was like oh my god, he did it. Oh nice.
RebeccaUm and well, so Snow was Bianca, and this is an really cool Indian woman.
MelUm and oh the one who just did the play in town, right? Yeah, yeah.
RebeccaSnow Adira um was Bianca, who's the only uh and there were two actors of color in that show. And I'm like, if you're gonna cast Don't cast the other non-white actor in your entire first of all, Houston casts that are all white kiss me the f oh yeah.
MelLike now I'm there with you. And a lot of theater, honestly, it's not just Houston, it's a lot of fourth wall does a really good job usually at university.
RebeccaThey are doing proof with an all-white cast, yeah. If you want to have a family look the same, sure. But the boyfriend can be any race.
MelYeah, absolutely. Well, and I'm I'm like the non-perist of like, you can't cast a black area. It's like she's a mermaid! She's a romance.
RebeccaThis is just such a cool conversation.
Alexis Co HostLike that's the way we always try to do 22 minutes. It's so much fun. We talk about stuff. And you know, trying to get to know people.
RebeccaYeah.
Alexis Co HostWhich is totally different than I've got these 16 questions.
RebeccaWhich do you all have do y'all have an unf following?
Alexis Co HostIt's beginning to be reasonable. Okay. Um we've had a couple thousand downloads.
RebeccaHey, that's considering you know how many fucking endless numbers of podcasts.
Alexis Co HostWell, and and our podcasts are not short. You know, a lot of people like the 15-minute, 30-minute.
RebeccaI see that's not enough for me.
Alexis Co HostI'm always like we we go up for like three plus hours sometimes.
KoomahWe did we did one where like in the middle of the what was it? Somebody came to the door to talk about candidates, so we just shifted and had them.
Alexis Co HostIt's one of the candidates we knew, and it's like, tell me, come on in. And so we just edited to the middle.
RebeccaUm Yeah, it's it's it's just a really and and I think that this movie no matter what what people's opinions of it are, it's definitely a conversation.
