{"id":846821,"date":"2026-09-13T22:24:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T22:24:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/846821\/"},"modified":"2026-09-13T22:24:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T22:24:12","slug":"anna-biller-rejects-camp-label-for-the-face-of-horror-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/846821\/","title":{"rendered":"Anna Biller Rejects ‘Camp’ Label for ‘The Face of Horror’: Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anna Biller<\/a> put plenty of blood into \u201cThe Face of Horror.\u201d<\/a> She just isn\u2019t sure it was enough blood for some of the folks at her movie\u2019s world premiere.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not sure it was 100 percent the right crowd,\u201d the filmmaker told IndieWire, the day after her extraordinary and heartbreaking ghost story debuted at TIFF Midnight Madness<\/a>. \u201cI think they wanted something more gory.\u201d<\/p>\n

Biller stressed that the screening nevertheless went well and the audience seemed engaged in the room. Still, she suspects some \u201cdude bros\u201d wanted fewer monologues and more maiming.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think they actually know the game that I\u2019m playing,\u201d she said. \u201cThey resent, in a way, having to sit through a women\u2019s picture<\/a> \u2014 a serious arthouse film<\/a>, that may not be what they [usually] watch. I\u2019m giving them all the surface of something lighter, and they\u2019re having to sit through something heavier.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jim<\/a> \"I<\/a> <\/p>\n

It\u2019s an irony as exquisite as one of Biller\u2019s cinematic paintings.<\/p>\n

Over the years, the writer\/director has been widely praised for her stunning visuals, but also routinely criticized for asking viewers to invest too deeply in the emotion beneath some of genre storytelling\u2019s most iconic surfaces. Early Letterboxd reviews<\/a> that reduce \u201cThe Face of Horror<\/a>\u201d to a comedy, or object to the epic\u2019s roughly two-hour running time, land like a stab in the heart for Biller.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe lack of empathy is staggering,\u201d she said. \u201cI see women suffering, and I experience it. I see the unfairness that women are subjected to in the world just every single day that\u2019s not talked about. It\u2019s a real problem in women\u2019s lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"\u2018The Face of Horror\u2019Courtesy TIFF<\/p>\n

Following 2007\u2019s \u201cViva\u201d and 2016\u2019s \u201cThe Love Witch,\u201d<\/a> Biller\u2019s third feature relocates the famous Japanese ghost story \u201cYotsuya Kaidan<\/a>\u201d to 14th-century England, where Kristine Froseth plays Eleanor: a pure-hearted woman whose clandestine marriage to a handsome knight (Jonah Hauer-King) becomes a waking nightmare. The betrayal itself is ancient, but its central discovery \u2014 that a supposedly \u201cgood man\u201d can be terribly cruel \u2014 feels as urgent as ever.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn this film, there\u2019s medieval misogyny, which doesn\u2019t feel that different to modern misogyny at times,\u201d Biller said. She further described the strength of that parallel as \u201calmost taboo\u201d in light of the alarming challenges that increasingly face women and girls today.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can talk about it in a medieval folk tale ghost story, and we can still feel it,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Biller traces the tension underlying that distinction to an insecurity specific to male-dominated genre audiences, arguing that films by women centered on women can be welcomed as visual novelties in programming spaces \u2014 where they are still resisted as psychologically serious art. That\u2019s where words like \u2018camp\u2019 stop functioning as description and start hardening into dismissal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do like the word \u2018humor\u2019 because there is intentional humor, of course,\u201d she said, noting that catharsis is key to many great rape-revenge films. \u201cBut \u2018camp,\u2019 I feel like it\u2019s failed seriousness.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Face of Horror\u201d is better described as a tragedy, in which two women battle unbearable hardship. Alongside the tortured Eleanor is her devoted sister, Beatrice (Ellie Bamber), whom Biller calls the \u201cfinal girl\u201d of the film. Familiar horror tropes and flashes of comedy, she said, don\u2019t diminish her work\u2019s gender politics. But calling an effort as methodical and intentional as this one \u201ccamp\u201d can give moviegoers permission to dismiss the sincerity of its pain.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a defensiveness,\u201d she said. \u201cLike, \u2018Please don\u2019t take this seriously because if we do, then it indicts us as men.\u2019 And I think especially horror fans, their entertainment is very safe for them because they don\u2019t ever have to see men called out for anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"THE\u2018The Love Witch\u2019 (2016)Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

That reflex \u2014 to treat women as decorative even when their anguish drives the story \u2014 has shadowed much of the critical conversation around Biller\u2019s work. It has also affected her ability to convert considerable influence into tangible power offscreen. After \u201cThe Love Witch,\u201d Biller said, \u201cEverybody was such a fan and said they thought I was such a genius and that they wanted to work with me on something else. And then it just never happened with anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

The gap between acclaim and opportunity opened widest around Biller\u2019s unmade \u201cBluebeard\u2019s Castle,\u201d an ambitious Gothic romance that struggled to secure financing. Biller told IndieWire enthusiasm cooled after producers read the screenplay and the project became difficult to place.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a really good script, and a lot of people knew it was a really good script, but it\u2019s because my work falls into this category that doesn\u2019t fit,\u201d Biller said. \u201cIn terms of programming, it fell between categories. \u2018Is this a main competition film? Is it a platform film? Is it a Midnight Madness film?\u2019 Well, it\u2019s always going to fall into something like Midnight Madness because they\u2019re afraid to take it seriously because of the color. But I\u2019m asking you, if another major filmmaker used this kind of color, would it be considered non-serious?\u201d<\/p>\n

Biller eventually transformed \u201cBluebeard\u2019s Castle\u201d into her debut novel<\/a>, but pushed ahead with \u201cThe Face of Horror\u201d as a sort of professional line in the sand. \u201cI was about to give up,\u201d she said. \u201cI thought if I couldn\u2019t get this made, I would just stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"\u2018Viva\u2019 (2007)<\/p>\n

Instead, she expanded with her most ambitious tale yet. An exhilarating demonstration of what can happen when Biller\u2019s exacting authorship is fully supported by the costly infrastructure of a professional production, \u201cThe Face of Horror\u201d stands as a testament to her clarity of vision.\u00a0<\/p>\n

On \u201cThe Love Witch,\u201d Biller spent more than two years drafting patterns and sewing costumes<\/a> herself because she couldn\u2019t afford a costume team. Doing everything wasn\u2019t proof she was picky, Biller said. It was how she chose to protect the film\u2019s integrity with the money she had.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like there\u2019s this misconception out there that I am a control freak that needs to do everything,\u201d Biller said. \u201cIt\u2019s not that. It\u2019s just that I\u2019m incredibly meticulous about what I want it to look like and I\u2019m not going to accept some bad horrible costumes just because I can\u2019t afford good ones. And if you can make them yourself, then all it costs is the fabric.\u201d<\/p>\n

With \u201cThe Face of Horror,\u201d Biller had a full costume room \u2014 with cutters, drapers, and stitchers who could translate her sketches into reality. The result is an even more luscious fantasyland than \u201cThe Love Witch\u201d that is equally authentic to the woman who made it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the first time I think I\u2019ve been on a movie that\u2019s being done like how movies are normally done, and it was quite fabulous,\u201d Biller said. \u201cI really enjoyed that.\u201d Having previously worked in virtually every department, she also arrived unusually fluent in what her collaborators required.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat happens when you\u2019ve worked in every department yourself is that you know exactly what everyone\u2019s job is,\u201d Biller said. \u201cI understand how hard it is, what they\u2019re doing and what they need, exactly what they need from me.\u201d That fluency left room not only for crew members to contribute their skills impeccably, but also for the cast to fully inhabit their roles.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe actors need to create their own characters,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m not creating those characters for them. I\u2019m not dictating how anybody should perform. I\u2019m not even dictating style.\u201d<\/p>\n

Froseth made Eleanor her own, Biller said, by drawing on emotions and experiences the director would never presume to define for her. During one of the character\u2019s bloodiest moments, Froseth became so overwhelmed that she stepped away from the set in tears. Within 10 minutes, she was back and ready for another take. Of course, Biller had been crying, too.<\/p>\n

\"AnnaAnna Biller, Jonah Hauer-King, and Kristine Froseth for Deadline at TIFF<\/a> 2026Josh Telles\/Deadline<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were both sobbing because it was such a moment,\u201d she said. That on-set experience gets to the heart of why \u201ccamp\u201d feels so inadequate when writing about Biller. The filmmaker and her star were not standing outside the tragedy, archly commenting on its excesses. Instead, they were expressing and enduring inside it \u2014 wholly embracing the agony their art suggests.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The same seriousness informs Biller\u2019s lighting. By visually separating her characters from their richly rendered environments, she wants audiences to perceive the human being before the production design surrounding them.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a way of separating the soul of the character so that you notice it more,\u201d she said. \u201cI feel like I want film to heighten what we need to look at or what we need to pay attention to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beauty and blood may tell us where to look in \u201cThe Face of Horror,\u201d but Biller\u2019s commitment to creating \u201cdignity for female characters\u201d informs both. Having come close to leaving movie-making behind altogether, the writer\/director has returned with a film that uses every tool at her disposal to insist on that integrity. It\u2019s funny, gorgeous, grotesque, and excessive, but none of that makes its pain insincere.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m trying to just be a faithful messenger,\u201d Biller said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Face of Horror\u201d premiered at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. It is seeking U.S. distribution.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Anna Biller put plenty of blood into \u201cThe Face of Horror.\u201d She just isn\u2019t sure it was enough…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":846822,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[356932,88,2695,206,356933,46686],"class_list":["post-846821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-anna-biller","tag-entertainment","tag-film","tag-movies","tag-the-face-of-horror","tag-tiff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/846821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=846821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/846821\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/846822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=846821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=846821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=846821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}