The Horror Revolution: First off, what’s your favorite horror movie? What movie scared you the most?
Colby Holt: My favorite horror movie is Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook, its themes are so smartly dealt with and it is unique in its grounded and personal approach to horror. The movie that scared me the most when I was a kid was Wes Craven’s The People Under The Stairs. Super disturbing and I probably should not have been watching it!
Sam Probst: For me, The Ring was easily the scariest. I was 13 when the movie came out and my imagination was very active, so the movie freaked me out so much. The gothic style of it was so distinct and the imagery really stuck with me. I remember driving somewhere with my mom on the night seven days after I saw the movie and I was crying because I was so convinced something was going to happen from watching the movie (lol). I also love The Descent from 2005. I probably watched that movie with my brothers over a dozen times when it came out on DVD, it was really intense and the interpersonal relationships played such an important part in moving the story along. Also had such a queer-coded element to it.
THR: Ganymede was an incredible film, and I really wasn’t expecting it to impact me the way that it did. What inspired the film?
CH: When I first started working on the script in 2019 the rhetoric around the LGBTQ community was really ramping up. It was also taking on a religious tone and you heard a lot of politicians saying that our community was “demonic” and we were trying to “turn” others. Which is obviously untrue. People are born gay or queer or trans, but nonetheless we were being spoken about like some sort of evil group of predators. So Sam and I started talking about what if you grew up in a household where this was the ideology, what if you believed your own homosexuality or queerness was an evil entity afflicting you and your family? What would that do to your psyche? How would that manifest?
SP: We are so glad that you liked it and that it had an impact! I like to say it’s sort of a genetic child of what Colby and I would create if it was ever possible to birth a queer horror film with your husband. We had somewhat different life experiences from one another, but with Colby growing up in Kentucky and my upbringing in Indiana, religion was a very prevalent theme in our backgrounds, as were the repressive structures of society around queer identity. We found a lot of solace taking elements of the worlds we lived in, the people we knew, and the identities of our own and peppering them into the story this ultimately became. To hear it moves others is something we are always so grateful to hear, while also realizing elements of this story are relatable to many in all sorts of modern ways.
THR: I grew up and still live in the South, and I’ve certainly experienced a lot of people who feel the same way the “villains” in your film do. I talked a bit about my own personal experiences in my review, growing up straight in a place that had at best a lack of respect for the LGBT+ community and at worse a hatred, and my own brother came out as gay in his late teens. I’ve always loved and supported him, but I never really was able to feel some of the things that he had felt growing up where he did in the environment in which he was raised, and I want to thank you for giving me that perspective to help me identify a bit more with what he went through. How important do you think telling stories like these are to helping people understand the lives of young gay men and women in America?
CH: I think there is this idea that in 2024 we are past this kind of struggle for gay and queer folks and the truth is that we just aren’t. While acceptance of LGBTQ people is nearly at an all time high, so are attacks against LGBTQ people. Those two things are linked together. Your experience as a gay or queer person often depends on the type of household or community you grow up in. We wanted to point out that in the South and rural America these divisions are playing out in sharper contrast. Many times you have wildly different viewpoints right next door to each other.
SP: Thank you for sharing your personal experience, it really is such a powerful sentiment to hear how it relates to others. It’s funny because I was just talking to my sister yesterday about a line in the film that I mentioned to her was something I used to secretly say to myself as a teen, which was Little Lee’s chant, “I’m neither gay, nor bisexual, I’m straight and heterosexual”, she talked about how that really stuck with her after watching the film, knowing it was part of my journey and how she nor the family knew the struggle in that way. I too had a very loving and supportive family, they did not cause any pain or repression for me, but the homophobic society I lived in really pushed me inward, which I did not tell anyone what I was dealing with. A huge way I was able to move out of my silence and embrace the person I am today was by watching films that showed queer characters, individuals dealing with internal struggles, and stories where love had power over darkness, those narratives showed me that I was not alone, and that there could be hope and ways to be accepted when all I had prior was a world I had shut myself into of fear and silence. I really hope someone watches this and can find some form of relatability to move out of the dark parts of their life and towards embracing the parts of themselves that they would otherwise be silent about or feel shame about.
THR: I likened your film to Kevin Smith’s Red State, one of my favorite films, but yours was a lot more serious than Smith’s. Though the villains in the film were a little over-the-top, it really doesn’t feel outside the realm of possibility that something exactly like this would be happening in real life. Do you feel that it was an over-the-top portrayal, or do you feel that it’s grounded in more reality than people realize?
CH: I do think it is more grounded in reality than people realize. As I said before, there is this idea that this issue is over, we dealt with it, people can come out easily, but there is really a backlash to all the progress our community has made. Right wing politicians are using us as a wedge issue to sort people into sides and motivate voters through hate and fear. When it goes over the top it’s because they’re viewpoints are over the top and not tethered to reality.
SP: Yeah Colby said often that writing it felt like it could be perceived as pushing over-the-top, but we both agreed that as time went on in making this movie, the world we lived in started to take on a similar identity to the movie. The way LGBTQIA+ rhetoric is weaponized, often through pious religious virtue, the way people will demonize queer folks and identify them as dangerous, we feel like we’re just highlighting the absurdity of the time we live in.
THR: The horror elements of the film were handled really well, and it’s so rare to find a film that actually is able to blend social concepts with an actual ability to scare without focusing too much on either. Were there any films that you looked to to help you strike this balance with Ganymede?
CH: We definitely looked to The Babadook or even Death Becomes Her for ideas on how to mix genre and keep it grounded. We had to ride the line on the tone of this film and so much of that comes from the performances and I would say that is where the blending of genre really took place.
SP: I know for myself the depiction of internal struggle was very important for painting a picture of horror. One horror/thriller-type movie that really wowed me as I was coming out was Black Swan, which did such a great job showing horror as perceived by a person’s internal struggles in conjunction with the pressure they faced in the world around them. I really thought about that movie a lot when considering how to show the struggle in and out of the character’s mind as a horror narrative progressed. For social concepts, I also loved the way American Beauty was able to highlight the behavior of suburban America and have fun with it. Those two movies were often inspirations for me when thinking about horror of the mind tied with societal nuances.
THR: What inspired you to want to become a filmmaker? Were there any films that made you know this is what you wanted to do?
CH: I am a firm believer that you move and influence people through touching their hearts and making them feel emotion and film is the best medium to do that. It’s so personal and if my goal is to leave the world or society in a better place than I found it, then this is the best way for me to use my talents to do that. Tommy Boy, The Birdcage, these are films that brought my family together or left me changed or shifted my worldview.
SP: I was making a bunch of home movies when I was a kid. Around ten years old, I started running around with a camcorder directing my neighborhood friends in movies, music videos, even recreations of Survivor in the woods behind our house. I was lucky to grow up in a time when basic video editing software and YouTube were just coming out on consumer computers, so I got to film, edit, and share videos all while growing up, which was invaluable to knowing what I wanted to do and jumping into film school. I think it’s awesome that people get to grow up now with the ability to film everything on their phones and edit directly on it and post to TikTok/YouTube, etc. I think it’s going to make for a very unique new generation of filmmakers.
THR: If you could work with anyone in the industry, alive or dead, who would it be and why?
CH: I don’t think I would work with him because he wouldn’t need me, but my favorite filmmaker is Mike Nichols. He feels like a mentor that I never met somehow, so even if I could have had a friendship or asked him for advice, that's who I would want to meet or know.
SP: Britney Spears. I don’t have a big explanation for it other than I’ve just loved her music and the person she is ever since I was a kid.
THR: I’m a huge believer that telling these types of stories is important in “normalizing” people who have spent so much of their lives feeling abnormal, and the handling of Jordan Doww’s character in the film shows the types of struggles in self-acceptance that young gay men go through. How much of telling that story, getting it out there and showing people that they’re not alone, came into wanting to write and direct this film?
CH: That’s the whole reason for making this film. This is for that teen watching this in secret under a sheet. This is for the Mom watching it while her husband is at work trying to figure out what they are going to do about theri queer child. This is for the Dad that just doesn’t get it. For the Mom who fought tooth and nail for her child to be accepted. This is to educate, to make people feel seen, and to change hearts and minds. So showing people they are not alone was top of mind through every stage of making this film.
SP: I know I touched on it a bit in one of the earlier questions, so for me it meant everything. I think about the closeted kid I was watching the few queer films available at that time, usually I was that kid hiding under a bedsheet watching these films, I distinctly remember the risk that felt like at that time and what it did for me to see those scenes of queer love and struggle play out. It was life changing to me and in many ways, life saving for me. To be able to possibly do something like that with the telling of this movie is a huge part of my personal intention.
THR: What’s next for you? Are there any upcoming projects you’re excited to talk about?
CH: We have two different scripts written and in the pipeline. Very excited about both of them and we are putting everything together. Not quite ready to share what they are about, but I can share that we will keep focusing on American life and contemporary American life in particular, and there will almost always be a queer aspect in anything we do. We will be thrilled to start talking about them when we can.
SP: We are so excited about what’s cooking up next! I’ve really enjoyed reading what Colby has written so far and we can’t wait to move forward on the next projects!
THR: Finally, what’s the most bizarre item on your bucket list?
CH: Completing The Great Loop with Sam– a 6,000 mile boat route through the US and Canada that takes you on rivers, up the East coast, and into the Great Lakes. Ideally, with a sweet rescued dog on board as well.
SP: Hmmm, that’s a tough one for me, maybe learn the choreo for the dances of as many Britney music videos as I possibly can learn? Maybe that’s bizarre to some, but I would love to achieve that. But also by default of being Colby’s husband, going on the 6,000 mile boat ride, haha. It does sound fun!
THR: Thanks again so much for taking the time, your film touched me in a way that I haven’t been touched by a horror film in quite a while. As an ally who didn’t start that way, I appreciate you giving me a perspective that I didn’t have before. These types of films really help show reality to people who haven’t experienced these things on a personal level, and while I’m sure that it will have an impact in the LGBT+ community in helping to feel accepted, it really opened my eyes to why they don’t. It’s one thing to tell people you love and support them, and it’s another to truly understand why they don’t feel loved and supported without you telling them. Thank you for that.
CH: Thanks for this note! This is exactly why we do it and it gives us great solace to know that for at least one person that was the case. Really appreciate your thoughtful questions and for you covering our film.
SP: I second Colby. Grateful for your questions and thoughtfulness around the work we’re putting out there!
