Sleepaway Camp

Best to step off sister.

Continuing my "end of summer horror" series, started Sunday night with Just Before Dawn, I decided to take a look at Sleepaway Camp, a notorious camp slasher that earned quite a reputation for the final image, a money shot that defined shock value and leaves the mouth agape. It explains why Angela is afraid of the water, doesn't shower with the girls, needed a secretly concealed 'physical exam" sent to Camp Arawak hiding a truth that her legal guardian (one warped guarantor for sure) never wants unveiled, and remains isolated from (and stares at) the other girls in her cabin in camp.

That's right, I'm the bitch around here...

The slasher part of the plot consists of certain characters who torment Angela (Felissa Rose) and suffer the wrath of a psychopath. A filthy, sleazebag head chef of the camp, corners Angela in the food locker, starting to pull his belt off when her cousin, Ricky, thankfully appears in the nick of time. He has a big pot of boiling water immersion thanks to the killer catching him in a chair, in a compromised situation just like other kids I'm certain he molested. I imagine people in the theater cheered when this scumbag got his just desserts. And director Robert Hiltzik doesn't pull away, letting us see him in agony, his flesh severely burned, peeling away. The monster of the film, besides Angela's co-camp counselor, Meg (Katherine Kamhi, about as ferocious as Judy), is queen bitch, Judy (Karen Fields), always looking for ways to push her buttons, antagonizing nearly every scene, vocally scathing, and never relenting in her personal attacks. Judy is specifically designed to irritate and enrage the viewer, so when she get what's coming to her, you will be begging for her execution to be harsh. Not much is shown, but what is implied, "Ouch". Let's just say it has to do with a curling iron and leave it at that. Meg has eyes for the plaid-pants wearing Camp Organizer/Operator, Mel (Mike Kellin, just watched him last night in Just Before Dawn), willing to just about hide anything no matter how heinous if it rescues his camp from scandal and a bad reputation resulting in a wide exodus of kids from the premises. A lot of the film is implied in regards to what happens to victims, such as how certain sleeping lads were executed in their sleep by the killer using a hatchet and a particular drowning (this is the kill that works the least to me; I had a hard time believing the killer could just overpower the victim and drown him considering his size compared to the psycho's); to think that the killer would butcher children asleep in their sleeping bags is really disturbing. I think the film does well in showing a build up to the body count slaughter. When you push and push, something's bound to eventually snap and nothing good can come from a volcanic eruption.

Damn your eyes!

When I was watching this movie tonight, I didn't find this as much a fun ride as I did unsettling. Angela has these cold eyes that stare a hole right through you. Can you imagine being on the receiving end of that death stare? It would give me the chills. It drives Meg and Judy crazy because they are always trying to elicit a response of outrage from her. She just stares and holds herself in this statue pause that curtails any attempts by her tormenters to provoke. But when you poke a bear long enough, it bites. Or someone does. The film presents another possibility...Ricky (Jonathan Tiersten), and Mel sure believes he is the one behind all of the horror befalling Camp Arawak. Mel goes as far as to attack the boy when a potential love interest is stabbed down her back, reasoning that he wants to shut down the camp!

I think the murders in the film, while not that gory, still pack a wallop because of what the violence implies, as I have mentioned above. Boiling water, a curling iron, bees (a nasty bit of business shows a face covered by them), a face after spending a night in the water with the hungry aquatic creatures, and a severed head. Notice above director Hiltzik's affinity for showing fingers from outstretched hands telling us just how painful it can be to inflame the wrath of the film's psychopath.

What I liked about the movie is how it shows a realistic portrait of a summer camp; I went to one in 1990 and remember the experience quite similarly, including kids swearing and talking about chicks. Except this film shows a summer camp turned on its head because of the actions of a certain few who didn't know to leave well enough alone.

What I think this slasher does best is highlight psychological trauma and how through the behavior of nasty people can trigger a laden psychosis ready to surface with just the right flip of the switch. You can sense at the film's conclusion, that it would end up this way. Raised as the killer was, forced to pretend to be something he/she was not at the behest of a guardian who wanted a certain type of child, hitting puberty, meeting a potential suitor, confronting sexuality and how to respond when kissed and touched in a way never before experienced, the neurosis due to personality conflicts he/she was having to address, along with the teasing and cruelty, there was a breaking point. Those unfortunate enough to be at Camp Arawak, in her/his sights, paid a price.