What she wants is really thrilling
watch Anna Biller's A VISIT FROM THE INCUBUS
This newsletter contains a brief discussion of depictions of rape and sexual violence in film.
In this issue: A Visit from the Incubus (2001, 26 minutes, Criterion Collection)
What she wants is really thrilling
Period movies are set in two times: the time they depict and the time they were made. Anachronisms in costume, make-up, and hair are transparently obvious when you watch older movies; even Ralphie Cifaretto notices it while watching Spartacus: “Look at Kirk Douglas’s fuckin’ hair. They didn’t have flattops in Ancient Rome!” We overlook seemingly obvious errors in style because we take for granted what movies offer us (especially when it comes to aspects like costuming that are perceived as feminine and therefore frivolous). The assumption is this is how beautiful women look now so this must be how they always looked. See Little Women winning the Oscar for Best Costuming. Sorry!
Anna Biller is a filmmaker whose work understands the importance of costuming and confronts the inherent anachronisms of period film. Biller is my favorite auteur, and frankly one of the few who actually deserve the label. She doesn’t only do the glory work of directing and writing but the lesser-appreciated production stuff, including costuming, set design, and scoring. The Love Witch (2016) is her best known project, a feature Technicolor fantasia about a Californian witch who uses magic to find love. But A Visit from the Incubus (2001), her part-Western, part-vaudevillian short about a woman tormented by a dream-stealing demon, is equally delicious and subversive.
The story is familiar to anyone who has ever been bothered by a man: Lucy (played by Biller) discusses the abuse with her female friend, Madeleine, who has secretly experienced something similar. When Lucy finds work performing at a saloon, the Incubus reappears and intrudes. He attempts to reframe his harrassment of her, singing a song that frames Lucy as a consenting partner and even the sexual aggressor. The crowd rejects the Incubus, Lucy triumphs over her abuser, and she performs a musical number all about the magic of show biz that drives the audience mad with applause. By the end, Lucy has regained bodily autonomy and control over the sexuality the Incubus was preying upon. She has not just rid herself of her abuser but disempowered and neutralized him.
Visually, A Visit from the Incubus is ornate and flimsy. The sets, which we only see for a few minutes, are stunning, but are still transparently sets. It’s set in the 1800’s Wild West, but also a mid-century soundstage, but also a 2000s microbudget indie–and all these elements crash together harmoniously. We see the void of nothingness through door frames and windows. Lucy flails in a lacy nightgown while still wearing blue eyeshadow and ruby red lipstick. The devil performs with showgirls in plastic devil horned headbands and ruffled knickers that look both like mid-century underwear and 2000s booty shirts. It’s deliberately playful and camp without making a joke of the substance of the story, or of Lucy.
The anachronisms in Biller’s movies are calculated, her artifice deliberate. Bad historical costuming always seems more egregious with female characters than their male counterparts, and I think there are a couple reasons for this. First, as we’ve seen at every red carpet, no one really cares what men wear as long as they show up and look clean. Second, women tend to be the audience for a lot of period dramas, and it’s important not to make the female avatars of the movie look too alien to modern eyes.
But I think the most frequent reason is just plain old misogyny. Lead female characters are not allowed to be ugly, and so fuckability is prioritized above accuracy or integrity. But bad costumes don’t just undermine the authenticity of the story, they undermine our trust in filmmakers. How much truth can there be in a story where women only exist to be eroticized?
Whether an audience finds Lucy attractive is not the point. When we see the Incubus visit Lucy, the assault is completely desexualized and paintedly grotesque. This might seem like an obvious filmmaking choice but it’s not–it’s a relative rarity in films. Rape is frequently depicted from the male rapist’s perspective and, if not overtly sexualized, highly sensationalized. Biller has talked a lot about the history of rape scenes and has said that she deliberately includes rape in all of her movies. In her notes on the rape-revenge exploitation movie I Spit On Your Grave (1978), Biller wrote of one of the (many) rape scenes, “Nothing is from her point of view. It’s about the male group. We are supposed to identify with them finding this magical available girl to do whatever they wish with. She is 100% an object.”
A Visit from the Incubus is a rejection of this tendency. You can take a simple reading of Incubus and say that Lucy liberates herself through her own objectification, her showgirl act essentially the 19th century version of an OnlyFans #girlboss. But I see her friendship with Madeleine and their shared experience as survivors as what ultimately makes Lucy able to seek freedom. Besides, as fantastic as the movie leans, Lucy’s victory is more realistic than it might initially seem. At the end she agrees to a five-year contract that seems like the 1800s version of the deeply manipulative studio system of the Golden Age of Hollywood. Her liberation is economic, and thus not necessarily replicable for other, future victims of the Incubus. And though she has her team of showgirls (which include Madeleine!), she’s surrounded by men at the end—and who knows how long they’ll stay friendly and supportive. What Madeleine said of incubi is true about a whole lot of other unkind systems Lucy now must tangle with: “They prey on your body, but they also prey on your soul.”
I’d love to hear your thoughts on your favorite period movies and costumes. There are a whole lot of wonderful bloggers that have influenced how I think about costuming. Here are a few of my favorites:
Karolina Żebrowksa on YouTube
Mina Le on YouTube
Micarah Tewers on the costumes of Little Women
I apologize in advance if leaving a comment on an article over a year old comes across as gauche... but having now read this a second time, I really do want to state how incredibly written this piece is. Your insights on the overlaps between depictions of sexual assault in film and anachronisms in period costumes are genuinely insightful in and of themselves. But you also weave both subjects together so intrinsically and effortlessly. There is a very nice 'flow' in your writing (for lack of a better term). I love the "glory work" line! And I greatly appreciate the link to Anna Biller's blog post about I Spit on your Grave.
I'm rather ignorant about period films in general; it's not a genre I have a good foothold in. You clearly have an eye for the finer details in period costuming that I sorely lack (which is part of the reason why I enjoyed reading this article).
Having said that, Autumn de Wilde's 2020 adaptation of Emma was a movie where even I noticed and greatly enjoyed the costume designs. Now that I think about it, Wes Anderson's last few theatrical movies (specifically The Grand Budapest Hotel, The French Dispatch, and Asteroid City) also stand out, no doubt the result of Anderson's idiosyncratic style. I also enjoyed the costumes in Ti West's Pearl.
I feel that my appreciation for period costumes (not to mention which films I picked) might come off as a bit superficial. Particularly to someone as knowledgeable about the subject like yourself. But that is also why I'd love to hear your take about the quality of the costuming in those films!
I feel like the obvious excellently costumed plus playing with anachronisim combo is Sofia Coppola's Marie Antionette. Especially with all the behind the scenes content of the cast doing VERY 00s things in full flawless period costume literally in Versailles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcpqaRqVWIA
I also LOVE period costumes and historical details don't bother me so much. Like I know the Little Women Uggs thing. But when I see that movie I see how they used the color to match the books the girls get for Christmas or Jo wearing Laurie's hand me downs.
Even though seeing like Gentleman Jack just FULLY commit is also a delight.