Review: Return to Sleepaway Camp (2008)
Slasher Sequel Not a Worthy Installment in Horror Series
Dec 31, 2008
Return to Sleepaway Camp is the fourth installment in a horror franchise that has slipped through the cracks for years, evading mainstream attention for a quarter century now. Painful to sit through and generally unpleasant, one can see why the series hasn’t prospered.
The first Sleepaway Camp, a low-budget 1983 slasher film set at (wait for it...) a summer camp, has developed a bit of a cult following in recent years, likely due to its what-the-heck ending. Bizarre plot twists aside, this modest flick offered little in terms of entertainment or scares.
Parts two and three in the series marked an improvement over the original because the filmmakers knew better than to take their subject matter seriously – and because Pamela Springsteen (aka Bruce’s sister) was brilliant as the camp counselor/killer Angela.
Then Robert Hiltzik, writer-director of the original, returned to ruin whatever dignity the series had mustered by unleashing 87 minutes of straight-to-DVD cinematic garbage upon casual and diehard fans of Sleepaway Camp. While horror sequels offer a nice reprieve from the loads of remakes hitting theaters, their overall quality is just as hit-or-miss.
Fourth Film Too Serious, Unlike Other Sleepaway Camp Installments
The blissful campiness (no pun intended) of previous entries is missing here. Instead, this one is overly serious, filled with ominous music, hateful characters and comeuppance. Hiltzik clearly didn’t want this movie to be a walk in the woods for viewers, so instead of a fun, brainless slasher flick, he churned out an immature, brainless revenge (of sorts) flick.
Set at Camp Manabe (is there a subtle joke in that name?), a very artificial-looking summer getaway run by a counselor from the Camp Arawak of the original film, Sleepaway number four is an hour and a half of campers tormenting a fat kid named Alan, punctuated by a handful of mediocre death scenes.
Said “campers” look old enough to attend grad school, and said fat kid looks like he just stepped off the set of a failed Nickelodeon sitcom. The counselors are middle-aged and more cruel to Alan than the campers. And there is a cameo appearance by Isaac Hayes as “the chef” that is even more untimely after his falling out from the show South Park and subsequent death.
Lousy Cast, Lousy Script Doom This Slasher Flick
It all makes for a very uneven assortment of characters that is painful to watch. The script handed them doesn’t allow for anyone to appeal to the audience, and the coarse dialogue is more fitting of one of those dime-a-dozen National Lampoon's projects than a summer camp slasher movie.
Even Alan, the poor kid who gets called names, gets spit on, and gets tricked into smoking a joint filled with cow manure, is a mean-spirited jerk who is completely detestable and undeserving of pity. One can only hope that these awful characters start dying off at a rapid pace.
Such is not the case. Much like the first Sleepaway Camp, this one plods along at a leisurely pace. In the 1983 film, there were seemingly more softball scenes than death scenes; in this sequel, a good hour is spent on Alan crying because everyone picks on him, and the slayings are hurriedly thrown in as an afterthought.
While most level-headed horror fans would likely avoid a second viewing of this embarrassment, someone must have enjoyed it – another sequel is planned for 2010.
