Hello Mudduh

 

Summer means a lot of things, including me using it as a reason to watch any horror movie set in a sleepaway camp.

Quick Plot: Our backstory comes via a creepily enthusiastic local news anchor reporting about the anniversary of the massacre at Camp Twilight. Seriously, she's REALLY excited about it.

Some years earlier (if I'm understanding this movie's timeline?), a young couple disappeared while skinny dipping. The next night, another pair (bitter middle aged moms who hate their families) were enjoying some much needed beers in the same spot when a figure in black drops by to murder them.

The keystone rangers are fumbling through some clues, but not quickly enough to stop the next visitors: a batch of failing high school students forced to attend a weekend trip at the same cursed location under the watch of principal Warner and enthusiastic teacher Miss Bloom (producer and co-writer Felissa Rose, who obviously knows a thing or two about sleepaway camps). 

The teens grumble and grope while their numbers begin to dwindle. Who could it be prowling the campgrounds in a sweatsuit that looks like it had to have the logo ripped off right before shooting?

Woof, Camp Twilight is not good. The acting makes RuPaul's Drag Race sketches feel positively Shakespearean, while the violence is so quickly staged that we barely register a character's in danger, let alone already stabbed to death. And the reveal...oh my, the reveal.

I actually won't spoil Camp Twilight, because honestly, while you might see the ending coming, it's probably the only real interesting thing the film has going for it. But let me discuss, without naming names, the coda.

After the massacre ends, the film goes on for another five minutes with audio newscasters telling us more developments in the case as the camera watches a car drive on a coastal highway. Over the course of these five minutes, we learn that our killer escaped, a survivor was institutionalized, our killer was spotted, our survivor was released from custody and then arrested (seriously, that one happens in one report), and that our killer was spotted again. I understand any low budget film cutting corners, but by god, there has got to be a better way.

High Points

Felissa Rose seems like a very cheerful and lovely person

Low Points

She's in a very bad movie

Lessons Learned

Just because you're a good enough athlete to have a full athletic scholarship doesn't mean you're able to outrun a slasher walking briskly

The best place to keep your convenience store gun is right in an open cubby

Florida detectives are not only bad at their jobs: they're also terrible at hemming pants

Rent/Buy/Buy

I'm sure there's a small contingent of horror completists who feel compelled to watch every slasher. That's really the only type of person who should watch Camp Twilight. It's on Amazon Prime if you're that kind of weirdo, or, I guess, if you're a parent to one of the actors?