Available on DVD August 9
Cast:
Will Denton as Tommy
Bruce Davison as Father McAllister
Connor Paolo as Jack
Jesse Eisenberg as Daniel
Dana Delany as Patricia
Andrew McCarthy as Michael
Valentina de Angelis as Melissa
Directed by George VanBuskirk
Review:
Anytime I see Jesse Eisenberg as the star in a film, it makes me want to kick a puppy.
Yes, Zombieland was fun, but beyond that, the dude bugs me because I don’t consider just playing yourself in every film actual acting. But maybe that’s me.
So when I saw he was one of the stars in Camp Hell, I immediately was predisposed to the fact that I’d just be seeing Eisenberg play himself once again but this time in a pure horror flick.
I wasn’t too far off in reality. Eisenberg plays himself once again but at least the plotline doesn’t involve social networking or some lame indie hipster comedy. Luckily, he’s just a bit part player and doesn’t really occupy much of the movie at all, which is a good thing.
Camp Hope, a Christian-based youth retreat designed for kids to get their God on because their parents don’t feel like they are close enough with Jesus, is the backdrop. There, these poor kids aren’t allowed to read magazines or comics, listen to rock music, use their cell phones (called “hell phones”), have any type of relations with chicks and they gotta wear pants at all times.
Camp Hell indeed.
Unfortunately, it gets worse, the youth must take daily communion, participate in a Jim Jones-ish dance/sing party, morning prayer time, discussions on the perils of rock music, learn how masturbation is the same as pre-marital sex and orgasms are sins and a host of other Kumbayah-type events.
But just as you think youâve tuned into the wrong movie and instead wandered into some flick that feels like a Parents Television Council version of Meatballs, things take a turn for the better. Okay, somewhat better. But really, could it get any worse?
Turns out that Satan seems to love those religious types. The Prince of Darkness just waits for just one opportunity for them to sin and then he jumps all over them with both feet and not only attacks that person but all of those around them.
So when hormone-raging Tommy (Will Denton) and Melissa (Valentina de Angelis) decide to meet in the woods for a late night rendezvous and wind up doing the deed â how dare they defy the God squadders! â a whole host of bad things come to the camp. The girls begin chanting weird stuff, someone defiles the prayer room, a bellowing sound thunders throughout the area and scary music fills the film for the last half hour. Oh yeah, real spooky stuff.
Supposedly, Camp Hell is based on real events that happened. But what these events were is hard to ascertain because everything is so damn boring. Maybe the real events were someone actually went to a camp like this, hated the fact that God was forced down their throat and had a nightmare about it. It is literally an hour of youth being preached to and a half hour of completely lame (supposedly scary) events that go nowhere.
They got part of the name right for this film â hell. Skip it unless you are a fundamentalist.
