I went into Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers expecting another run-of-the-mil 80s slasher (or if you prefer "dead-teenager movie"). I expected the worst. C'mon, middle of the forest? Busty campers way too old to be sent to summer camp? The obligatory ghost story around the fire which recaps the original film? Girl wanders off alone and loses her way? That's when the movie knowingly winked at the audience, and I grinned as the first murder took place. Yes, the killer had become the hero, and the horror had become comedic. Thank you, oh thank you, thank you director Michael Simpson and writer Fritz Gordon.
Angela Baker returns, this time played by Pamela Springsteen, as an overly chipper (dare I say "dorky") camp counselor who looks on the verge of spraining something with that wide smile. Wait, it gets better: she sings a goofy "happy camper song" with enough enthusiasm and good cheer to power the Monsters Inc city for centuries. Were this woman not a homicidal maniac with a demented sense of humor, you'd want to slap that smile off her face. Instead she's kinda lovable (admit it, you sick jerks want to see a horror-movie with a shotgun-wielding psycho dressed up in a Barney suit just as much as I do.)
As for everyone else in the film? We know they're fodder, the director and writer know they're fodder, hell the actors know they're fodder, so everyone says "screw it. Throw in a bag of slasher archetypes everyone hates and let Angela go to town." And there lies the joy of Unhappy Campers. Go Angie! Kill them! Kill them all! Wait, lemme get some popcorn. One more sec, need a Dr. Pepper too! Okay, now we're set. Massacre away!
A few of the campers decided they'd scare Angela by dressing up as horror movie icons which made me giggle with glee. These nitwits made their "scary costumes" at the arts and crafts table the crayons were a nice a touch. "Ooh, this is going to be so scary!" They tell one another. "Yeah, this'll scare her for sure!" One goes with a hockey mask/machete combo; the other goes with the dirty fedora/bladed glove. Angie wants to play too, so she shows up to the party with a chainsaw and a leather face. And for the first (probably last) time ever, I cheered for TCM.
Oh, and you haven't lived until you've seen this frustrated female killer stomp away with her chainsaw. She finds another victim, and the thing just won't start! *sigh* Or when Angela realizes she has to kill the gossipy character in the next room, and she goes on the hunt for a suitable weapon, testing all the mundane everyday items lying around, weighing each in her mind, trying to find just the right one. So casual in her selection she might as well be going through her closet deciding, "Hmm, what blouse would go with this skirt?" Let's not forget when Angela chases one of her victims through the forest and calls out, "Wait! I just want to be your friend!" You hear Angela's voice, and she sounds like she really truly means it
never mind the knife in her hand.
On the down side, while Angela is very entertaining, the movie doesn't go far enough. Sleepaway Camp 2 calls attention to the over-indulgence of boobs by indulging in boobs, but it never offers its own comments on the low standards of DTMs. The violence blindly mirrors the violence of its parent films, but never evolves beyond it nothing like the geyser of blood from the wall (of all things) that made Evil Dead 2 so pointed. SC2 was there, had these silly slasher staples in its sights, but didn't pull the trigger why not go gunning for these things while blasting everything else? The horror genre, and especially the slasher sub-genre, gives parodies so much ammunition. Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers spots a machine gun, which is fun
but better movies, like Evil Dead II, notices someone left the keys to a frickin' tank just lying around and goes for a joyride.
