September 23, 2018
Written by: Fritz Gordon
Starring: Pamela Springsteen, Tracy Griffith, Michael J. Pollard
Quote: [The Angela Rap]: "Angels are pretty, angels can fly, and here is the angel that'll make you die! You got no style and you got no cares; all ya do is fight and swear. So say your prayers and make amends, cause ya life story is about to end."
Trivia: The script originally contained more elaborate deaths for the characters, which had to be changed for budget reasons. Herman was to have a flaming poker shoved into his crotch, with Angela proclaiming it "A wienie roast!" Also, Tawny and her entire news team were supposed to die in a fiery explosion after Angela cut the brake lines to their van.
Yesterday's movie Aerobicide inspired me to continue with my true cinematic love, the slasher film. It is with joy and some regret that I conclude the Sleepaway Camp sage with Sleepaway Camp III: Teenage Wasteland (I read somewhere that their was a fourth one made a decade or so later but it is more or less just a bunch of clips from the first three movies strung together with shots of bikini girls thrown in to attempt a new narrative... I don't know if this film really exists but if it does, I will watch it). Sleepaway Camp III was filmed just six months after Sleepaway Camp II and contains all the things that made that movie so great: great kill scenes, perfect one-liners, a bit of nudity, and a comedic take on camp slasher genre. Once again, Angela is back at camp incognito, but this time it is at an experimental camp where they combine troubled youth with privileged children (the campers are supposed to be 16 or 17 but I bet the average age between them is closer to 25).
The second and third Sleepaway Camps do not really need plot summaries, you could probably guess what happens, but here is one nonetheless. The film begins with a topless girl that has "milk" and "jugs" tattooed on her breasts going out and getting ran over by a truck driven by Angela. Angela takes the girl's identity in order to get placed in Camp Rolling Hills, an experimental camp meant to celebrate diversity by partnering troubled inner-city kids with privileged children. At the camp, she quickly realizes that the camp kids are problems (sex, drugs, violence, the usual), one camp counselor is a pedophile, and the other is lazy and apathetic. Angela's weird sense of morality means these people need to all be killed off. There is a third counselor named Officer Barney that is a cop whose son was killed by Angela in the second movie. Eventually, as the bodies begin piling up, Officer Barney realizes Angela's secret and he too much die. In the end, Angela decides to let two campers live only to be stabbed and nearly dies. But, of course, she wakes up in the ambulance just in time to kill the paramedics.
True to its form, this movie has a great cast of characters. There's Tony the touch Latino kid from South Los Angeles (although the actor was born in Pittsburgh and is most likely an Italian actor). There's the tough Asian girl with lines like "Drop dead, fag!" and "They're afraid we'll fuck." The punk who spray paints everything, trees, tents, rocks, you name it. The black rap fanatic who pulls a gun on Angela when she tells him to turn down his much. There's the slutty girl who is banging the camp counselor. There's the prankster who keeps throwing fire crackers at people (wasn't this same character in the last one?). There's the Young Republican Reaganite rich kid. The southern belle racist girl. And the good girl who falls for Tony despite being warned that "he's a Mexican." Also, the movie has its first Academy Award Nominee, Michael J. Pollard, who played C.W. Moss in Bonnie and Clyde (he also was great as a drunk in Scrooged), who plays the pedophile counselor.
Like the previous films, this one also has some classic deaths. The most memorable one has Angela bury the fat lazy counselor up to her neck and then runs her over with a lawnmower. Later in the film, one of the campers discovers her body and we get a glimpse at the bloody mess. Angela also shoves a fire cracker in the nose of the prankster blowing up most of his head, she burns the rapper alive and roasts marshmallows over his burning body, the Asian girl is decapitated (with a really poorly made prosthetic head), a news reporter is tricked into snorting drain cleaner, the girl killed in the beginning of the film is thrown into a trash compactor, the Young Republican's arms are ripped off when they are tied to a car, and of course you have your run of the mill stabbings and whatnot. Angela even gives us the first gun death as she shoots the cop after taunting him about killing his son (cold blooded!).
The film also somewhat tackles race and class relations. The first night in camp, Tony says something to provoke the rap enthusiast causing him to call him a spic, hastening a fight. The southern belle calls the rap enthusiast the n-word. The young republican is confused when his sexual advances are rejected by Angela, claiming that your type always want it. Finally at the end of the film, when Tony says he wants to move to the good girl's town she has to reject him because she already has a boyfriend. Tony was just an exotic fling for her. We could over analyze the social commentaries of the film, but really they are probably just there to keep the plot moving.
This movie is just as fun, gory, and funny as the first film and it's a damn shame that Pamela Springsteen's Angela didn't get more movies. She's the villain that you cannot help but love. Oh, also this movie has a great soundtrack with an intro song by Anvil.
...what's your thoughts?
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