Stumbling upon the 2024 horror movie "Camp Pleasant Lake" without ever having heard about it, of course I had to sit down and watch it, given my love of the horror genre. However, I must admit that I wasn't exactly harboring any particular grand expectations to the movie, as it just didn't really have that particular feel to it. But I still opted to give writer and director Thomas Walton the benefit of the doubt.
"Camp Pleasant Lake" was an archetypical masked slasher flick. But unfortunately not a great one. The storyline and script was pretty straightforward, although it was riddled with plot holes and things that just made zero sense. For example, why wouldn't the Rutherfords have a carefully planned and orchestrated routine of how to faking the deaths of the campers or councilors, but would just wing it as things went along? That made absolutely no sense for something set to take place at a camp site that ran horror experiences for paying customers.
I am rather impressed that a horror movie with the likes of Andrew Divoff, Mike Ferguson and Bonnie Aarons on the cast list would prove to be this abysmal. In addition, there were a couple of other familiar faces on the cast list, with the likes of Michael Paré and Robert LaSardo. The acting performances in the movie were fair enough, but the actors and actresses were seriously struggling with having nothing worthwhile in terms of script, dialogue or character gallery to work with.
And the fact that character gallery was as bland as tap water just didn't help promote the movie either. I have to admit that I didn't care one bit about any of the characters, much less the masked killer. In fact, the masked killer proved to be more of a comedy gag than anything else.
This was a lousy attempt at making a slasher, even with some of the effects being so dubious that you just had to go back and see it twice, to ensure that you hadn't seen it wrong, and coming to believe that effects could be that horrible. I loved the fact that when throats were cut, the blood would appear an inch or two above the line where the cut was made. That was just such an amateurish thing.
It amazes me that the movie had a staggering 6.2 rating here on IMDb when I sat down to watch it. This movie is a dumpster fire of a slasher flick. Sure, if you are a newcomer to the horror genre and slasher subgenre, then I guess that the movie comes off as being watchable. But if you have grown up on slasher movies, then "Camp Pleasant Lake" is just a movie you want to forget about ever stumbling upon.
My rating of "Camp Pleasant Lake" lands on a generous three out of ten stars.
