Phantasmal Gallery
Phantasmal Gallery
Rebecca Lee Lerman
In Red
2025
A Little Bit About The Artist
A Statement From The Artist
This sizzle was created for my Seed&Spark campaign as an early expression of In Red—a short proof of concept for an eventual feature. The Feature Logline: A Mixed Asian woman makes a deal with a dark entity to go back in time and kill her boyfriend’s abuser—at the cost of her soul. As a Mixed Asian actor, I began writing roles for myself out of a lack of opportunities and representation. Inspired by my own survival of abuse, I use witchy and magical elements to explore how trauma lives in our bodies and warps reality. Haunting elements of a lush, stylized color palette inspired by Suspiria create a world that is both surreal and emotionally raw. Ultimately, In Red will break the silence around abuse, particularly within Asian American communities, offering catharsis and healing.
Do you like scary movies? And if so which ones?
I love horror because it drags the darkest parts of humanity into the light and forces us to look. It cracks us open, confronts what hurts, and somehow turns it into catharsis. Watching Midsommar, I felt the pain of my own emotionally abusive relationship go up in flames—like it was leaving my body—as Dani, stripped of her family and clinging to an emotionally unavailable boyfriend, finally finds belonging in a cult that mirrors her grief… while he burns inside a bear. Get Out is genius in how it weaponizes horror to expose racism, showing Black bodies literally exploited for white gain. The Substance slices open the violence of beauty standards through grotesque body horror. I’d also include The Haunting of Bly Manor, which reminds us the real ghosts are unresolved trauma, and Baby Reindeer, where Richard Gadd’s unflinching recounting of abuse offers healing and visibility to survivors. Horror doesn’t flinch—it confronts pain and transforms it into something beautiful.
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Who's your fave Final Girl and why?
Pearl is my favorite Final Girl because she’s messy, vulnerable, and terrifying all at once. She embodies what happens when family abuse manifests in the darkest possible ways. Her desperate, endearing fantasy of becoming a movie star makes her heartbreakingly human. Mia Goth plays her with such raw complexity that you can’t help but root for her—even as she’s the one doing the killing. Pearl isn’t just surviving horror; she is the horror, and that uniqueness sears into your brain.
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What is the biggest influence in your practice?
The biggest influences for my feature are Black Swan and Pan’s Labyrinth. Both films end with women lying on the floor, bleeding out—but they’re smiling. They’ve given everything, even their lives, to claim their transformation. I walked out of those films knowing I had to write a story that builds to an ending like that—raw, haunting, and triumphant all at once. But I needed to center a Mixed Asian woman in that space, to give her the kind of complex, cathartic journey I’ve rarely seen on screen.
