August (like most months) was an amazing time to be a woman who loves other women. This can be chalked up to two major releases: the film “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma,” written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun, and the album Lost Weekend by Phoebe Bridgers. While not explicitly related, these projects could be soul sisters. Both works are the third solo projects from their respective creators, both are by queer women on the Millennial-Gen Z cusp and both have been rattling around in my head for weeks, speaking a more similar language with each revisit. But before I get into their shared themes of letting yourself be loved, the depths of transformation and the inherent power of women making art, let me tell you about each on its own. 

“Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” tells the story of Kris Williams (Hannah Einbinder), an up-and-coming filmmaker who is hired to reboot the fictional Camp Miasma slasher series for a modern audience. The original movie (and each of its soulless spin-offs) revolves around Little Death, a camper drowned by bullies at their lakeside summer camp for being a “freak.” A boy for half the week and a girl for the rest, this character is a nod to the classic slasher trope of gender-nonconforming villains. The killer is masked by an air conditioning vent, dressed in white plastic and armed with a spear. Little Death remains at the bottom of the lake waiting for the next installment of the franchise, the next batch of victims. 

Needing to find the plot for this next movie she’s been hired to make, Kris travels to the abandoned campgrounds from the first film to meet Billy Presley (Gillian Anderson). As a teen, Billy played the “final girl” in the original film. That performance was a young Kris’ sexual awakening and Billy is the key to understanding the “flesh and fluids” that compel the film and the reality behind it. 

The movie is funny and warm, like the copious amounts of blood that flood the screen. It is visceral and awkward like teenage sex ought to be. The main romance is unsettling and alluring, sexy but suspect. It is a lovely movie about loving movies; Schoenbrun’s respect for the craft of filmmaking is undeniable. There is so much more to discuss, from the great performances to superb writing to amazing setting and design. But for now, it’s Phoebe’s turn.  

Lost Weekend has everything a certified Pharb (a Bridgers fan) had been missing for the six years since Bridgers’ last solo album. These new songs are ripe with her classic lyricism that is kind of sad, kind of funny and very on the nose. My first listen left me confused about how I was supposed to sing along to a number of the tracks that were instrumental or just un-sing-along-able. I still thought the album was good with its more captivating backing (I think I heard a mandolin, which I quite enjoyed), but I wasn’t sure I loved it. That being said, something pulled me back in. 

As I heard the lyrics and understood the meanings, I began to appreciate how Bridgers finds solace in the humor of horror. In “The Governor’s Waltz,” Bridgers hides “in the bathroom like Shelley Duvall”; “Haunted” creates a dreadful tension between sleep and consciousness, dreaming and then having to live the dream out. It’s funny, though. And perhaps this funny, scared feeling is the “something” that keeps bringing me back to the album. 

I listened to Lost Weekend on my way to see “Camp Miasma,” and after leaving the theater buzzing from that epic, sad, funny, gay movie I loved, I was drawn to the album in a different way. Now when I hear Bridgers’ ethereal voice singing, “pushed head first into the world, just to be thrown in the street when you’re dressed like a girl,” I can’t help but see Little Death waiting at the bottom of the lake. And when I hear, “I remember the day I created the world, I got blood on my favorite shirt. … I was gonna show you colors you had never seen, and leave you alone,” I can’t help but think of Kris and Billy running, blood-soaked in their respectively skimpy and elegant outfits. 

The scenes from the film and the lyrics of the album go hand in hand as they explore what it means to let people see (and even love) you, how it feels to stagnate and disappoint when you try to love (or look) back. They articulate the liberatory, mystical experience of making art and the sometimes indistinguishable difference between fiction and fact: the performance that forces one to transform both themselves and the world around them. These are works of art about making works of art and the realities of life as the creator. 

And now, 800 words later, perhaps you can tell that I’ve gotten carried away. Really, you should just go and see the movie. Listen to the album. You could even listen to the album on the way to see the movie. A hidden blessing of the closest showing of “Camp Miasma” being in Columbus is that the hour-long drive is the perfect length for a Phoebe Bridgers pregame.