{"id":1244,"date":"2024-07-23T15:19:50","date_gmt":"2024-07-23T15:19:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=1244"},"modified":"2024-10-14T14:10:45","modified_gmt":"2024-10-14T18:10:45","slug":"sleepaway-camp-ii-unhappy-campers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/07\/23\/sleepaway-camp-ii-unhappy-campers\/","title":{"rendered":"Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong>\u00a0 (1988)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Double Helix Films\/Horror\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 80 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (graphic violence, gore, language, nudity, sex, drug and alcohol use- all involving teens)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Michael A. Simpson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Fritz Gordon\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: James Oliverio\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Bill Mills\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 26, 1988 (US, limited)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Pamela Springsteen, Renee Estevez, Anthony Higgins, Valerie Hartman, Brian Patrick Clarke, Walter Gotell, Susan Marie Snyder, Terry Hobbs, Kendall Bean, Julie Murphy, Carol Chambers, Amy Fields, Benji Wilhoite, Walter Franks III, Justin Nowell, Heather Binion, Jason Ehrlich, Carol Martin Vines, Tricia Grant, Jill Jane Clements.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Body Count: 18 (19 if you count the questionable fate of the \u201cfinal girl\u201d)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0The bitch is back! That\u2019s what the tagline for Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong> should have read. In this sequel to the 1983 teen slasher flick (a cult classic!), Angela Baker is as insane as ever only now she knows how to hide it better. She\u2019s also a full-fledged woman now having undergone a sex-change operation during her stay at a psychiatric hospital after her killing spree at Camp Arawak five years earlier. Yep, the \u201csurprise package\u201d seen at the end of the first movie is gone!<\/p>\n

\u00a0I read on Wikipedia that Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong> got a limited theatrical release in August \u201988. I can tell you that it did NOT play here in Philly. I\u2019d remember something like that. I\u2019d have been all over it. To this day, I still don\u2019t pass up a good (or bad) horror sequel. I didn\u2019t even hear of it until that fall when I saw the cover sitting on the shelf of new releases at West Coast Video. I grabbed that sucker right up, dashed home and went straight for the VCR. I knew it wouldn\u2019t as awesome as the original movie. It\u2019s still pretty good.<\/p>\n

\u00a0This time, the killings take place at Camp Rolling Hills where Angela, now played by Pamela Springsteen (Bruce\u2019s little sis), is a counselor. She\u2019s just named Counselor of the Week by camp director Uncle John (Gotell, aka General Gogol of the Moore-era James Bond flicks) for her enthusiasm and positive attitude. He probably would not have bestowed this honor upon her if he knew she murdered a camper the night before, a girl she claimed to have \u201csent home\u201d because of her bad behavior. If there\u2019s one thing Angela doesn\u2019t like is a bad kid and she\u2019s got a cabin full of them like slutty Ally (Hartman) and pot-smoking twins \u201cThe S*** Sisters\u201d (Chambers and Fields). The only good girl is Molly (Estevez, Heathers) who becomes romantically involved with Sean (Higgins). Naturally, Ally tries to seduce him.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Nobody at Rolling Hills likes Angela all that much. The campers think she\u2019s an uptight spoil sport for her tendency to put an immediate stop to wholesome summer camp activities like panty raids and photographing topless girls. Head counselor T.C. (Clarke, Eight Is Enough) really can\u2019t stand her and wants to see her gone. Meanwhile, Angela sends many of her girls home which really means she kills them and hides their bodies in an abandoned cabin right out of a Friday the 13th<\/sup> movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Now we get to the good stuff, the real reason Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong> exists. I refer to, of course, the kill scenes. We get some pretty cool ones this time. Angela cuts some girl\u2019s tongue out. Two girls are burned alive. One girl gets it with a power drill, another with a chainsaw. Somebody has battery acid thrown in their face. One victim is decapitated. Somebody is strangled with a guitar string. Throats are cut, multiple stabbings and one victim has his hands cut off. The worst is saved for poor Ally. She\u2019s lured to the abandoned cabin where Angela stabs her in the back a couple of times before drowning her in an outhouse toilet filled with feces and leeches. How appetizing.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The thing about Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong> is that director Michael A. Simpson brings an element of black humor to the proceedings. Hence, the references to classic teen slasher pics like Friday the 13th<\/sup>, Nightmare on Elm Street and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Also, notice anything about the characters\u2019 names? They\u2019re all named after Brat Pack actors- e.g. Judd Nelson, Molly Ringwald, Ally Sheedy, Demi Moore and Anthony Michael Hall- of the era. It\u2019s a brilliant touch actually.<\/p>\n

\u00a0For me, Felissa Rose will always be the real Angela Baker. Her performance in the original movie is one of its strongest assets. It\u2019s iconic. She brought a vulnerability to an otherwise creepy teenage girl with an alarming secret. That being said, Springsteen does pretty well in the role. Angela hides her murderous tendencies with an ultra-positive attitude that really comes out when she leads the campers in a rendition of the \u201cHappy Camper\u201d song replete with hand motions. Yet she\u2019s also a stickler for her own rules governing how good girls and boys should conduct themselves. Violate one of those rules and it brings out the killer bitch in her.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The rest of the cast does a pretty good job, I guess. Of course, that term is relative. For a cheap horror sequel like Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong>, the level of acting on display is just what the genre calls for. You get the usual character types- e.g. slut, sassy black girl, horny preteen boys, partying types, etc. What strikes me as odd is that the campers look more like college students. They\u2019re clearly too old to pass for camp kids. The whole scenario looks more like spring break with chaperones. Bare breasts are flashed more than once. It doesn\u2019t look like any camp I ever attended.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Given my appreciation of crappy horror sequels, am I really the most reliable person to review a movie like Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong>? I would say an emphatic YES! Perhaps there\u2019s some bias but what you have to understand is that I can\u2019t review it like I would movies of greater quality. It\u2019s good for what it is and it\u2019s a good thing the standards aren\u2019t very high in this particular category. It has violence, blood, hot babes, bare boobs, minimal plot and a killer with a killer sense of humor.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The movie\u2019s biggest reveal is the father of a camper is one of the cops that arrested Angela after her first murder spree. Uh oh, was that a plot spoiler? Not really. It\u2019s more of an \u201cOh, okay\u201d kind of thing. Either way, Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers<\/strong> is good goofball fun. It more or less paved the way for direct-to-video sequels like Angel III: The Final Chapter, Howling IV and Prom Night III. In its own way, it\u2019s a classic\u2026. kind of, sort of.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers\u00a0 (1988)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Double Helix Films\/Horror\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 80 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (graphic violence, gore, language, nudity, sex, drug and alcohol use- all involving teens)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Michael A. Simpson\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Fritz Gordon\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: James Oliverio\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Bill Mills\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 26, 1988 (US, limited)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Pamela Springsteen, Renee Estevez, Anthony Higgins, Valerie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1749,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,8,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-horror","category-scary-gory-wild-i-love-it","category-sequels-remakes"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Sleepaway-Camp-II-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1244","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1244"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1244\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1880,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1244\/revisions\/1880"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}