You won't be coming home: Sleepaway Camp (1983)

Sleepaway Camp (1983) (AKA Nightmare Vacation)
Rating: ***1/2
Starring:  Felissa Rose, Jonathan Tiersten and Karen Fields


A day at the lake changed it all; fathers John and Lenny were enjoying a leisurely boat ride with their children when a group of waterskiing youngsters accidentally ram their motorboat through the family, killing most of them. The horrific incident is survived by one, a child named Angela.

 Eight years later, Angela has grown up to her early teens and is living with her Aunt Martha and her cousin Ricky. Stricken mute and awfully shy, she is sent to Camp Arawak to enjoy a holiday with her cousin, only to face unpleasant characters there including an obnoxious owner, a chef with a pedophilic fetish, and Ricky’s snobbish ex-girlfriend from the previous summer. Because of her awkward behavior, Angela is instantly picked on as a freak by both her peers and some of the counselors, only finding comfort from Ricky and his friend Paul.

Just as it seems the kids about to go through one hell of a Summer full of bullies and angst, the camp is suddenly rocked by a series of bizarre accidents and murders, leaving a trail of dead campers and counselors. All of it, curiously, appears to be linked to cousins Ricky and Angela...

There's no denying that Sleepaway Camp (1983) is generally routine; the backwoods premise, the two-dimensional characters, the methodical murders, all the key points of your typical camp slasher. Some even considers this film as one of the many Friday the 13th (1980) rip-offs (which is bull, honestly), but whether it is one or not, it does very well for itself by mixing classic horror tropes with coming-of-age teen drama.


Looking past the hammy acting and the nostalgic summer camp fun, Sleepaway Camp (1983) can be a sullen watch with its morose atmosphere and a few disturbing set-ups, all of it centering around a disturbed girl who's trying to come out of her shell, only to be verbally and emotionally beaten back by snobs and brats, as well as threatened by grown creeps and jerks. This is where the bodycounter elements slowly slither into this horror show as someone is making sure those responsible for giving hell to poor Angela are dropping dead like flies in the camp, leading to a fairly good killing spree and a revelation that honestly came out of nowhere, but it's a twist no horror fan can ever forget.

That said, the film honestly boasts a great selection of murders from a foul drowning with an equally unsettling aftermath, to death by bee stings; from a savage back evisceration, to one very nasty iron curler shoved down a lady hole. Sleepaway Camp (1983) keeps its guilty pleasure rolling by making most of the victims deserving of their fates for that sick yet fun ride, though it's not above adding a few innocent campers here and there for some guaranteed shockers! Interestingly, this is perhaps the one backwoods slasher out there to have more campers getting killed than counselors, adding a bit of notoriety to this B-Flick's reputation as these kid victims got younger by the minute.

Sleepaway Camp (1983), by all means, can be a cheese fest, but it has its share of genuine creepiness and brutality that earned its popularity. It's shock and shlock going side by side, perhaps one of the better early 80s slashers to come out during the golden age!

Bodycount:
1 male and 1 child ran over by a speedboat
1 male pulled down into a lake, drowned
1 male stung to death by bees
1 female had her back sliced open with a hunting knife
1 female smothered with a pillow, gets a hot curling iron shoved into her groin
4 boys hacked to death with a hatchet
1 male gets an arrow shot through his neck
1 male decapitated
Total: 12

Just the girl we're looking for?