Review

At Camp Manabe torturing the weaker campers is on the agenda, ably supported by the underpaid camp staff who when they are not joining in on the festivities are pretty much not worried by it. We're talking teens with little to no supervision beyond camp owner Frank and his junior partner the 'roid abusing Ronnie who stops them short of killing each other. Alan is the brunt of the majority of shenanigans, but given he's a big girl's blouse that's not surprising. So business as usual as Camp [s]Arawak[/s] Manabe then.

Clearly someone isn't happy about the situation and is going to take toll on miscreant campers and any counsellors who are not doing their job. No one is safe. Could Angela be back, or has Alan finally cracked, or has Ricky decided to take up where his cousin left off, or do we even care? The final, to date, Sleepaway mess ensues; thankfully it also spells the end of our movie event, hurrah!

For no apparent reason Robert Hiltzik decided 2008 was the right time to resurrect his most infamous property, turning in a true sequel involving a lot of the same characters, pretty much a similar storyline, and more campers being slaughtered. The difference here is that Hiltzik is trying to mask his killer in a misguided attempt to catapult a shock ending into our lap. Unfortunately the shock ending can pretty much be seen loitering in the lobby and if you don't pick who the killer is pretty quickly then I'm going to be so disappointed in you.

Jet: I was wondering if we shouldn't be popping the champagne corks as the final credits came up for this flick, sure it's quite possibly the worse entry in the franchise, but hell it marks the end of the movie cycle for us at least. No doubt Boredwood will at some stage dust off the original and do a remake, sans boobs and real gore to ensure a PG13 rating, so something not to look forward to there kids. Must admit I was initially wondering how one character got his job, still am really, but in keeping with the speed of this franchise you really shouldn't overly think about the setups.

Missing from the movie is the all important T&A, sorry folks nothing to break up the momentum this time round. For no apparent reason Hiltzik seems to have thought his movie didn't need one of the staple requirements of a slasher, my apologises to any feminists strangely reading, but someone has to make a statement on it. Ladies and Gentlemen it's our public duty to give due warning here. So for anyone dialling in for some mild titillation then you are going to be right out of luck, Hiltzik seriously thought his movie wouldn't need bouncing boobs and naked dudes.

The Director tries to capture the glory of his first movie, having not realised that was a load of crap to begin with

Jet: I was actually quite surprised by this element, which shows pretty much in my opinion how backward looking and morally strapped the Yank film industry is. Apparently okay to show gory death scenes but let's not go near T&A. Must be a disappointment for the U.S lingerie and silicon industries. Without the promise of nubile flesh, for all demographics yo, there's not a lot left to say about this poorly made, horribly acted, slice of film.

Strangely the movie tries to throw up a bunch of possible suspects, with the 'roid abusing Ronnie becoming increasingly paranoid and blaming anyone who comes into his orbit. The victims are spelled out from the start, you can make a list and mark off the character deaths as they happen, with simply no attempt at building atmosphere or tension. If you want to waste your time sitting through teenage hijinx, of the bulling variety, then knock yourself out there. It takes too long between the death scenes, did I just say that? - and to be honest the actors aren't good enough to fill in the blanks. I was checking email at stages as this one dragged its sorry arse through the motions till we get the "shock" ending everyone was expecting.

Jet: While we can work out who's going to die, support characters given some screen time, they still managed to do so via the most stupid decisions imaginable. Dude almost gets an impromptu vasectomy via a sharpened stake thrust up from the floor below him, so naturally you hunker on down to see what the story is. This stain on the genetic pool deserves what he gets. The other aspect to this was the characters that were introduced, spent some time with, who then promptly disappear for the rest of the movie. Say what!

As expected, given the previous flicks, the dialogue is atrocious, some of the characters go over the border of irritating - was waiting on Alan getting slaughtered with some relish I must say, and the plot is pretty ludicrous. Think I've now worked out why the Yanks are so enamelled by cartoon movies such as Drag Me To Hell (2009) and The Cabin in the Woods (2011), when schlock like Return to Sleepaway Camp is the alternative. I'm real happy I live in my part of the word, if you think any of the movies mention have merit then give up the booze and drugs, your living in some weird fantasy land.

Jet: To be honest I would watch Return to Sleepaway Camp over anything by Rob Zombie, at least Return knows it's working in a situation where it borrows heavily from previous movies, Zombie hasn't got that off his chest yet. Actually if left with those choices I'm burning my DVD player and taking up soccer.

Guess we're up to review length, hell yeah! Return is a pretty piss poor effort that doesn't try to improve on Robert Hiltzik's original. We get bad acting, atrocious scripting, and a series of kills that are the flicks' only claim to frame. No recommendation, this is the sort of movie you would expect to run across in a Millpond 50 movie box set. It's actually hard to write a review about a movie with zero redeeming features, but Felissa Rose does reprise which was kind of a highlight I guess.

Jet: Nothing much more to add here, the movie sucks the life out of the university even by slasher standards. Horribly the flick looks like it got some sort of budget, which didn't stretch to actually doing anything interesting. A cash in on a movie name with dubious merit, don't support them and maybe they won't make another one. Boredwood remake in 4, 3, 2 ...