Sleepaway Camp (1983)

July 15, 2018

Directed by: Robert Hiltzik

Starring: Felissa Rose, Jonathan Tiersten, Karen Fields

Quotes: She's a real carpenter's dream: Flat as a board and needs a screw!

Trivia: Felissa Rose's mother did not want her to be the killer in the film due to her being too young, so in the scenes where you see the killer's arms they are Ricky's (Jonathan Tiersten) arms. In one scene when the killer appears underneath the canoe with Kenny, it is Jonathan Tiersten wearing a wig; which is more obvious during Judy's death scene, when you see the killer standing in the doorway.





I grew up in the early nineties during the heyday of Blockbuster Video (and Hollywood Video). My friend Steve and I would head right to the horror section and choose movies based largely on their titles, the cover, and the pictures from the film that they would usually include on the back. Sleepaway Camp was one of those movies. The plot is pretty straight forward and there isn't much that separates it from Friday the 13th and the other camp slasher movies... That is until the last few minutes of the movie. In case anyone has not seen them 1980s gem, I will wait until the end of this post to spoil the ending. If you don't want the ending spoiled please do not read the last paragraph of this discussion. This was the second movie (of thirteen) presented by Joe Bob Briggs on his The Last Drive-In and I couldn't help but taking a look at this incredible film.

Sleepaway Camp begins with a boating accident killing a father and son leaving the daughter, named Angela (Felissa Rose), in the care of her aunt. Angela and her cousin/brother Ricky (Jonathan Tiersten) go off to a summer camp where people rapidly begin being killed. Angela does very little talking instead she spends most of the movie staring off into space and getting picked on by the camp bully Judy (Karen Fields). The head of the camp suspects Ricky has been killing others as a way to protect Angela but in the end it turns out the Angela is the murderer.

Felissa Rose does a great job as Angela. Although she says very little during the entire movie, she has this great far away stare that makes it seem like she is in an entirely different movie. This makes her all the more scary when we finally realize that she has been the one killing everyone at the camp.

The girl with far away eyes

The school bully Judy is also a great character. I was surprised when I looked the actress up on IMDB and aside from another Sleepaway Camp movie, she hasn't done any other acting. She was so good as the bratty bully! She has a couple of truly great lines: "She's a real carpenter's dream: Flat as a board and needs a screw!"

There are some great death scenes. The cook has boiling water spilt on him frying his face. Another person has their face covered with bees after a bee hive is shoved through their bathroom window. Judy's death, aside from the ending, is probably the best death scene. After picking on Angela too much, the killer takes a hot curling iron and from the shadows we see it inserted into Judy. Nothing is explicitly shown but the viewer's imagination fills in all the blanks... if you're not sure what I'm referring to think of the crucifix scene from the Exorcist.

Being an eighties film, the movie chocked full of homoeroticism and scantily clad men. I'm not sure why directors did this so much in the eighties. Every guy is in short shorts and cut offs. The eighties were a very weird time for fashion cinema. At one point during the baseball game, I expected "Playing with the Boys" from Top Gun to start playing.

Oh, and this guy with the amazing fake mustache is in the film:

The filmmakers make it very easy to side with the killers. The camp is apparently ran by pedophiles and people who find pedophilia funny. There is a very creepy scene where the cook makes a sexual comment about the thirteen year old girls and the other cook starts to crack up. He makes a comment to the effect, "oh you, always talking about molesting children, ha ha." Very weird. Later on the cook lures Angela into the kitchen and tries to assault her, luckily her brother is there to protect her because God knows no one else at the camp will. Finally, the camp head himself apparently had been trying to date one of the counselors who agrees to go on a date with him later on. All the adults at this camp are perverts.

SPOILERS - DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE

What sets this movie apart from other camp slashers is the final scene of the movie. This is where it is revealed that Angela is the killer. Unlike other movies, this isn't the big reveal. The big reveal happens when a naked angel Angela who is holding the severed head of another camper turns around to reveal that she is a boy. The image of Angel's startled screeching face on a naked boy's body is something that has stayed with me since I originally saw it. It shocked me when Steve and I first watched it in high school and it was still shocking today. I was lucky to get to watch it this time with my wife who had never seen it. The surprised expression on her face was absolute gold.

The movie will go off to spawn several sequels which are all good in their own right, but never matched the magic of the original film.