Summer Camp (2016)

Perfect cast and a good story

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Shot in Spain this starts off reasonably interesting but quickly descends into an hour or so of infected people chasing non-infected people which becomes tiresome & tedious. It's also confusing as the infected become uninfected, then infected again. The ending is reasonably good but it's too little too late. The title sound more like a slasher movie, perhaps it would have been better had it been one instead.

"Summer Camp" tells a story of four American counselors who sign up for summer camp duties in...Spain. The movie opens innocuously enough with the counselors testing each other's "trust" by navigating (while blindfolded and bound) through the terrain, while another counselor gives them direction. Seems as though, however, they are being watched by someone. There is also some HUGE pieces of pollen blowing throughout the camp.When they finally make it to the "camp," minor repairs are being done. The fountain is being fixed, food is being prepared, and other things are being readied for the arrival of the children. When the animals for the camp's petting zoo arrive, that is where the trouble begins. It seems a dog (a beautiful German Shepherd) has contracted some sort of disease. This is where the script kinda went awry and things got just a little muddled for me.It seems that either (a) the infected dog brought some sort of disease that is passed from animal to human, causing complete maniacal behavior; or (b) the pollen that has blown in contains some sort of contagion and that infects the campers one by one. Madness will eventually consume ALL the counselors, but (in a different spin) the madness is only temporary and all will eventually return to normal.Because of this one story flaw, I am a little iffy about recommending this movie because my questions were never answered. However, it was decently acted, and there was a nice sense of dread as the madness overtakes each counselor. Their fight to survive was not unbelievable, but it was tiring--in a good way. "Summer Camp" is not a great movie, but it is decent enough entertainment in a year that (so far) just hasn't lived up to the enormous hype. Rated "R" for horror violence and language, "Summer Camp" (although refreshing) still falls a little short of its mark.

It starts off in familiar territory: a small group of young counselors in a remote camp. However, just by reading the movie's summary, you'll already know it's not going to follow the same trajectory as others with this same set-up. The premise borrows heavily from a sub-genre of horror movies such as "28 Days Later" and "The Crazies," where people suddenly suffer from a plague of unknown origin that causes murderous rage (again, part of the brief summary here on IMDb). What it adds is an interesting twist in that the people who are inflicted by this "rage" suddenly snap out of it, and are clueless to what happened while in its grip. The positive is that multiple people could suddenly go off at any moment; it's not just one person who's suddenly gone insane and the rest get picked off one by one. This adds some tension, but unfortunately the filmmakers seem to only touch on some of the implications of this condition that could elevate the premise from "scary" to "horrific." For instance, the characters all come to realize that they all are infected, and they all cycle in and out of this madness. If the screenplay had been fleshed out enough so that the characters could dwell on the facts that, not only do they not want to kill a friend even in self-defense (especially knowing they'll eventually come back to normal), but there's also now a fear that they themselves might be killed in self defense when they're suddenly in the grip of unstoppable rage.Instead, the movie careens from one person going crazy (sometimes multiples at the same time) to another, to another, etc. and it becomes tedious. There's no time for character development (although at times the movie adds in nuggets of characters' back-stories which are obviously added for the viewer to feel something for them, but are too sparse to register as anything other than awkward and misplaced), and the constant growling/snarling/attacking starting about 1/3 into the film never ratchets up any tension. By going from 0 to 100 so early and then consistently staying there becomes monotonous and actually reduces the fear factor since it's basically doing the same thing repeatedly.In addition, it relies way to heavily on the camera shake technique. Not the "found footage" type, but the kind that's meant to convey action, confusion, and chaos (and yes, probably shift attention away from budgetary constraints). That can work well in small doses, but again, when the action starts so early and doesn't stop for an extended period of time, it greatly reduces its effectiveness. The viewer is bombarded with quick-cuts and constant camera-shake which becomes annoying and and pretty much defeats the whole purpose.I applaud them for an interesting premise, and both the acting and the effects ranged from passable to good. I just think fleshing out the premise and expanding on its implications would have pushed it beyond just another zombie-like "rage plague" movie that many horror fans have seen enough times already.

It seems like just another slasher stereotype: a group of young attractive camp Counselors, alone in the woods trying to get to know each other before the kids come. This time around however, a strange outbreak turns anyone exposed into a raging murderer for a small period of time. It eventually wears off, but do to the nature of how it spreads, anyone at anytime can become the slasher and as easily not become the slasher.It makes for a very suspenseful film not knowing who was going to be the slasher or the victim at any given time, and it was very impressive that they kept this up with so limited resources for 83mins. It's starts off slow and very corny. The movie is filled with a lot of OMG and WTF moments that are very slasher campy, but as the mystery of the outbreak begins to unravel the camp turns form bad to really good. Summer Camp seems to go for one big punch line instead of a few good kills, which turned into a smart tactic that makes this cleaver film work.It's the type of Horror film all slasher fans should check out.