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Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma (2026) Review: Is It Scary, and What It's About

In US theaters now · MUBI · Written & directed by Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw the TV Glow) · Winner of the Cannes Queer Palm

By Alan Willey · · Updated

Promotional backdrop for Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma (2026), Jane Schoenbrun's Cannes Queer Palm-winning meta-slasher.

Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is in US theaters now, having opened Friday, August 7, 2026, distributed by MUBI. It is the third feature from Jane Schoenbrun, the writer-director of I Saw the TV Glow, and it arrived at Cannes 2026 as the opening film of Un Certain Regard. It won the Queer Palm and drew a nine-minute standing ovation.

Camp Miasma is not a real slasher franchise; Schoenbrun invented it for the film. The story follows a young filmmaker hired to reboot a beloved fictional 1980s summer-camp slasher series, who becomes obsessed with the reclusive actress who played its original final girl. It is a slasher film about slasher films, and a queer love story.

We have seen it. It is a beautifully made film that is almost entirely uninterested in frightening you: we scored it 1.0 out of 10 for fear, which puts it near the floor of our catalog, and counted three jump scares ourselves, all of them minor. The blood is real and the craft is not in question. Whether the film lands for you depends on whether its dream logic connects, and for us it did not. Read our full Darkly scores on the film page.

How scary and how gory it actually is

We scored Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma 6.3 out of 10 overall. The individual numbers say more than the total does.

Fear is 1.0. That is near the floor of our catalog, and it is not a close call. The film is not built to frighten anyone: the stalking and the kills are staged as homage and as memory rather than as threat, so almost nothing in it is played for dread. We counted three jump scares in the theater, all of them minor. That count is our own rather than one compiled from a jump-scare database.

Gore is 6.0. The blood is real and the mid-film massacre is the most sustained violence in the film, but it is stylized to the point of unreality, closer to a geyser of colour than to something that hurts to watch.

Atmosphere is 7.2 and Intensity is 5.0. The mood is genuine and carefully built, all painted backdrops and grain and snow, but it is a pleasurable mood rather than an oppressive one, and the ordeal it puts you through is moderate. This is a film that wants you dreaming, not braced.

What that adds up to is a well-made queer romance wearing a slasher's clothes. If you want to be scared, this is not the film. If you want to see what a slasher looks like when someone uses it to talk about desire and fandom, it is worth your time.

Our full review of Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is on the film page, alongside the five-axis score profile.

Is Camp Miasma a real slasher franchise?

No. There is no real "Camp Miasma" film series; Jane Schoenbrun built the entire fictional franchise for this movie, mythology and all. In the story, Camp Miasma was a 1980s hit that spawned sequels, merchandise, and a cult following around its killer, "Little Death," a gender-fluid teenager bullied to death by fellow campers who comes back as the series' masked slasher. That backstory covers the themes Schoenbrun's films return to: queerness, cruelty, and characters turned into monsters by how they were treated.

The film follows Kris (Hannah Einbinder), an up-and-coming director who uses Sundance buzz to get the Camp Miasma reboot and becomes fixated on casting Billy (Gillian Anderson), the mostly-forgotten actress who was the original's final girl.

Schoenbrun's most conventional horror film

Schoenbrun's earlier features, We're All Going to the World's Fair and I Saw the TV Glow, are not conventional horror. Both deal with the internet, old television, and how the screens people grow up staring into shape them, and both use horror to get at the difficulty of becoming yourself. Camp Miasma is their most conventional horror movie to date, a slasher homage with real kills. It is also still unmistakably Schoenbrun, psychedelic and psychosexual, and the two female leads hold the film rather than the body count.

It opened Un Certain Regard, won the Queer Palm, and drew a nine-minute ovation from the festival audience.

Einbinder and Anderson: the central pair

The film centers on its two leads. Hannah Einbinder (Hacks) plays Kris, the fan-turned-director; Gillian Anderson plays Billy, the recluse Kris is trying to bring back in front of a camera. As the two work together, the relationship turns obsessive and psychosexual, and it bleeds into the production. Both performances are the best thing in the film. The supporting cast includes Amanda Fix as the young Billy, Eva Victor, Sarah Sherman, Zach Cherry, Arthur Conti, and Patrick Fischler.

Will Camp Miasma land for you?

Schoenbrun's films divide viewers: some connect with them strongly and some do not connect at all. That held for us. The craft, the performances and the music are not in dispute, and the film still did not reach us, because its dream logic is the thing you either follow or you don't. How you felt about World's Fair and TV Glow remains the most reliable predictor.

The question of whether a Schoenbrun slasher is actually scary now has an answer, and the answer is no. Go for the romance, the images and the two lead performances. Do not go expecting to be frightened.

Where to watch Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma

It is in US theaters, released by MUBI, having opened Friday, August 7, 2026. There is no digital rental, purchase, or streaming option yet.

No digital or streaming date has been announced. MUBI distributes its own theatrical titles and normally brings them to the MUBI subscription service afterward, so that is the likely eventual home, but the company has not confirmed a date and we would rather say that than guess one. We update this section the day it is announced.

Related films on Watch Darkly

  1. The Final Girls(2015)

    The closest existing comparison: a meta-slasher in which characters get trapped inside a fictional 1980s summer-camp slasher franchise. It shares Camp Miasma's premise of a made-up slasher series treated as real.

  2. Scream(1996)

    The film that made the slasher self-aware. Camp Miasma works in the meta-slasher mode Craven established: a horror movie that knows which horror movies it is quoting.

  3. Friday the 13th(1980)

    The 1980s summer-camp slasher template the fictional Camp Miasma franchise is modeled on. Little Death is the fictional franchise's answer to Jason Voorhees.

  4. Bodies Bodies Bodies(2022)

    Another recent queer slasher with a satirical, internet-era sensibility. The closest tonal comparison among recent wide releases.

Common questions

When does Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma come out?
It opened in US theaters on Friday, August 7, 2026, distributed by MUBI, and is playing now. It premiered May 13, 2026, opening Un Certain Regard at Cannes.
Is Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma scary?
No. We scored it 1.0 out of 10 for fear, near the floor of our catalog. The film is not built to frighten: its stalking and kills are staged as homage and as memory rather than as threat, so there is almost nothing in it played for dread. We counted three jump scares in the theater and all of them were minor. It is a dreamlike, psychosexual romance in slasher clothing. The full five-axis breakdown is on the film page.
How many jump scares does Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma have?
Three, and all of them are minor. We counted them ourselves while watching rather than compiling the number from a jump-scare database. For a film sold as a slasher that is very few, and it matches our fear score of 1.0 out of 10.
Is Camp Miasma a real slasher franchise?
No. There is no real 'Camp Miasma' series. Jane Schoenbrun invented the fictional franchise for this movie. The story is about a director hired to reboot that made-up franchise, whose killer is a figure called 'Little Death.'
What is Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma about?
A young queer filmmaker, Kris (Hannah Einbinder), is hired to reboot a once-popular 1980s slasher franchise, Camp Miasma. She becomes obsessed with casting Billy (Gillian Anderson), the reclusive actress who played the original's final girl. Their working relationship becomes obsessive, and the reboot's production turns violent.
Is Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma confusing?
Yes, and it is built that way. It is a fever dream of a film that does not lay its story out plainly, and we did not fully get it on one viewing. We would rather tell you that than pretend to a tidy answer. Schoenbrun works through memory and association rather than straight plot, so scenes tend to land emotionally well before they land logically, and a lot of the film is doing its work below the level of what is literally happening. Not understanding it on the first pass is a normal response to it, not a failure to keep up. Our own reading of what it is about is on the film page, in a spoiler-gated section under Deep Cuts.
Do you have to understand Camp Miasma to like it?
No, but it helps to know what you are in for. It is a mood and a feeling before it is a plot, so if you are willing to sit inside it without a clean explanation, it works. If you want a slasher whose story resolves plainly, it will frustrate you. We scored it 6.3 out of 10 overall while finding it genuinely hard to parse, which is roughly the shape of that trade: the craft, the performances and the music are excellent, and whether it lands for you depends on how much you need a film to make sense as you watch it.
Who directed it?
Jane Schoenbrun, writer-director of I Saw the TV Glow (2024) and We're All Going to the World's Fair (2021). Camp Miasma is their third feature.
Who's in the cast?
Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson lead, as Kris and Billy. Supporting cast includes Amanda Fix as the young Billy, Arthur Conti, Eva Victor, Zach Cherry, Sarah Sherman, and Patrick Fischler.
Did it win anything at Cannes?
Yes. It opened Un Certain Regard at Cannes 2026, where it won the Queer Palm, and earned a nine-minute standing ovation. Critics gave it a 100% Rotten Tomatoes score.
Is it gory?
Moderately. We scored it 6.0 out of 10 for gore. It is an R-rated slasher, rated for bloody violence, gore, graphic nudity, sexual content, drug use, and language, and the mid-film massacre is the most sustained violence in it. The blood is real but heavily stylized, closer to a geyser of colour than to something that hurts to watch, so it lands well short of the catalog's genuinely punishing films.
Does Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma have a clear ending?
Not entirely. The film deliberately leaves part of its resolution open, and Jane Schoenbrun has said as much in interviews. To avoid spoilers here, our reading of it is in the spoiler-gated section on the Camp Miasma film page.
How much has Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma made at the box office?
About $3.68 million domestically as of August 21, 2026, and it is still playing. It opened on five screens in New York and Los Angeles to roughly $250,000, a per-screen average among the year's best, then widened to a peak of 1,036 theaters in its third weekend. For a MUBI limited release that is a strong run rather than a wide-release number. No production budget has been disclosed.
Will it be on streaming?
No date has been announced. MUBI released it theatrically and normally brings its own titles to the MUBI subscription service after the theatrical run, so that is the likely eventual home, but nothing is confirmed. We update this answer the day a date is set.