The Inexcusable Transphobia of Controversial ‘Incident in a Ghostland’ [Horror Queers Podcast]

Joe Lipsett

Shut Up, Pascal!

May continues to be a month of extremes. Trace and I started the month with Jane Schoenbrun’s microbudget creepypasta film We’re All Going To The World’s Fair, followed by our usual Friday the 13th film,  Friday the 13: Jason Lives. Then last week we headed Down Under for notorious kangaroo-killing Ozploitation flick, Wake in Fright. Now we’re tackling notorious French director Pascal Laugier’s North American film Incident in a Ghostland (2018) which has no shortage of controversies.

In the film, a family of three – Colleen (Mylène Farmer), older sister Vera (Taylor Hickson) and dreamy younger sister Beth (Emilia Jones) – move into a deceased family member’s home that is infested with creepy dolls. Almost immediately they are savagely attacked by a Fat Man (Rob Archer) and Candy Truck Woman (male actor Kevin Powell). Years later, Beth (Crystal Reed) – now a successful horror author – reunites with her mother and sister at the house where the nightmare really begins…

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Episode 179 – Incident in a Ghostland (2018) feat. Xero Gravity

This week we’re covering our second Pascal Laugier film, 2018’s Incident in a Ghostland. C/W: misogyny, transphobia.
 
Along for the ride is Blerdy Massacre co-host Xero Gravity, who joins us in getting increasingly aggravated with the Martyrs director the more we learn what he thinks he’s doing with this film, which includes a lot of teen female abuse, a caricature trans woman villain and unabashed love for HP Lovecraft?!
 
We’re more forgiving of the twist, as well as the performances of Emilia Jones and Taylor Hickson (whose disfigurement on the film’s set is another controversy Trace unpacks).
 

Plus: TCM-meets-giallo production design, a sly police subversion, a groan-worthy typewriter and dolls everywhere.

Cross out Incident in a Ghostland!

Coming up on Wednesday: We’re sticking with grim material as we dive into Álex de la Iglesia’s 1997 exploitation/crime film, Perdita Durango (aka Dance with the Devil). C/W: rape

P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for more than 180 hours of additional content! This month, we’re discussing horror movies that make us cry, Shudder’s new zombie(ish) movie The Sadness, the remake of Firestarter, Alex Garland’s Men and an audio commentary on 28 Weeks Later to commemorate its 15th anniversary!

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