I think that if a movie is featured on Fearnet Channel it should, in fact, be a horror movie. While writer-director George Van Buskirk is able to cobble together a few ominous sequences, Camp Hell, for the most part, is a tepid coming-of-age film in which brooding protagonist Tommy Leary (Will Denton) decides that the fundamentalist sect of the Judeo-Christian faith that has enveloped his family and friends is not to his liking. On behalf of everyone who managed to sit through this sleepy spectacle, I would just like to add, “Congratulations.” And “Who gives a shit?”
Obviously Van Buskirk must be connected to “somebody” in the filmmaking community, because he managed to cajole Andrew McCarthy, Dana Delany, Bruce Davidson and Jesse Eisenberg into appearing in this painfully amateurish production, which looks like it was shot on Super 8 film. Throughout its 99 interminable minutes, Camp Hell (originally titled Camp Hope—Oooh! Scary!) attempts to dress-up an adolescent lad’s clumsily symbolic account of losing both his virginity and his religion, with occasional references to Satan, who seems to be lurking in the bushes at Camp Hope, a strict Christian camp run by authoritarian asshole Father Phineas (Davidson).
Sadly, there is no Satan, no demon, no monster, no murder, no nothing, no kidding. Even the scene where Tommy dry humps his girlfriend for the first time, and thus opens the doorway to all sorts of temptations and pleasures of the flesh—has all the drama and passion of a QuikBooks tutorial. The power of Christ and I compel you to avoid Camp Hell.
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