Hey folks, Harry here with that evil effects man... MYSTERIO and his contrary looks to THE GIFT and HAPPY CAMPERS... On The Gift, he didn't care for it like Moriarty did.... and on HAPPY CAMPERS, he hated the film. As with all things... there are different opinions... perhaps you'll agree with Mysterio instead of Gregor or Moriarty, or perhaps you'll think him a loon... to each his own eh? Here's that disgruntled canadian hater (it is a union thing).... Mysterio
Harry, took this camping trip about a month or so ago…
“HAPPY CAMPERS” is the directorial debut from scribe Dan (“Heathers”, Batman Returns”, “Hudson Hawk”) Waters. He also takes his first stab at directing his own material, and I’m sorry to report, while his campers may have been “happy”, this camper was definitely not.
When a militate camp counselor (played by Peter Stormare) gets sidelined by a freak accident, his seven coed-college freshman camp counselors (say that one 5 times fast) are forced to take over his directorial affairs, and make summer one to remember for their kid campers.
The film stars Brad (“Apt Pupil”) Renfro & Dominique (“Lolita”, “Face/Off”) Swain as Witchita and Wendy, two camp counselors who are the main focus in the film.
They are complete opposites. He’s a cool, dark, brooding, handsome and widely worshipped guy by his kids and co-counselors. She’s an overly happy, energetic, conservative girl with looks. Their relationship is rocky at first, but when Witchita sees something that convinces him that maybe their destined to be together, he begins to let down his guard, and let her in. Wendy also begins to open up to him, and romance blossoms, much to the amusement of the kids and other counselors.
And like any camp film, there’s your fair share of cliché moments, such as food fights, competitive pranks, crass jokes, puberty, and wacky hi-jinxes that ensue whenever the opportunity arises.
But, unfortunately the script poses no truly like-able characters. They’re either not fully developed, stereo- typical or just plain annoying. And the humor is just down right mean-spirited and without any heart. Sure, I know black comedy (which I believe this was intended to be), and “Heathers”, Waters first script (which won the indie spirit award) was dark, cynical and razor sharp in it’s wit and satire, and had something to say. Here, the only similarities I could find, was Waters’ structure in the use of his characters’ narrative to drive the “plot” forward. Lost are the rest, including the story, which never really amounts to or resolves any situation or real character growth and the film never really finds it’s voice either.
That’s a shame. I like Waters’ work in general, and I think that’s what disappoints me the most. Truly unfunny and offensive to some (of which some either walked out, or shot off remarks of disgust), it leaves little merit in really liking this film. Want a better camping movie? Rent “Meatballs.”
New Line is set to distribute this film, which luckily had a low shooting budget, so it’s inevitable failure at the box-office shouldn’t hurt too bad.
And talks of a “Heathers” reunion seem sequel-bound, but if this film is any indication of the direction it might go, the project should best be left dead and buried.
Camping just plain sucks.
After this camping trip gone horribly wrong, I decided to make my way towards Savannah, GA., where I heard future “Spidey”-helmer, Sam Raimi was directing his next studio picture. Blending in was never easier, nor was lifting the script… for “THE GIFT” that is.
Let me say here first, I have no personal dislike towards Raimi regarding the “Spidey” project and do agree that he’s the right man for the job. His “EVIL DEAD” flicks are classics in their own right that remind me of how wonderful special effects and make-up were back in the days; messy and chaotic, but downright cool. “DARKMAN” was good comic-book fun, and his most mature work to date, “A SIMPLE PLAN” was a great terrific, small little film, that showed with a solid script he could direct his actors with confidence, garnering strong performances from his cast.
With “THE GIFT”, I feel that Raimi is attempting the same, as he did with “PLAN”. With a lead cast consisting of: Cate Blanchett, Giovanni Ribisi, Keanu Reeves, Hilary Swank, Greg Kinnear, Katie Holmes and scripted by Billy Bob Thorton & Tom Epperson, this September 7, 1999 draft begins promising enough.
WARNING: SOME MINOR SPOILERS BELOW / A KEY PLOT POINT REVEALED
Annie Wilson (Blanchett) is a single-mother raising 3 kids on her own in the small Arkansas town of Parker (Pop. 9,567). To help make ends meet, she performs physic readings on some of the local townsfolk inside her home, in exchange for donations.
Their schoolmates who insist that their mom is a witch ridicule her children. This angers her eldest son Mike (age 11), that he often finds himself in trouble defending his mother by fighting.
Which leaves Annie to pick up her boy from the school principal, WAYNE (Kinnear), who seems to have underlying, affectionate feelings for Annie, but is in a torrid relationship with one of his ex-students, JESSICA (Holmes), who’s now in her twenties while he’s in his early ‘30’s.
The other townsfolk, either appreciate her kindness and sincerity from her physic help, or plainly just dismiss her practices as “voodoo” mumbo-jumbo.
One that does appreciate her is the local tow-truck driver, BUDDY (Ribisi), who’s unstable emotionally, with violent tendencies and a bit slow wited.
Things begin to get more personal than Annie would like when ANITA (Swank) confides in her that she’s being physically beaten by her cheating boyfriend, DONNIE (Reeves), to which Annie suggests that it doesn’t take a reading to tell her that she should get out and contact the police.
Anita lives in fear that if she does, Donnie will find and possibly kill her. Annie consoles Anita by suggesting that to her, Donnie does not seem stupid enough to do such a thing.
But once Donnie learns of Anita’s meeting and talking with Annie, he pays her a threatening visit one night, telling her not to meddle into their affairs and keep to herself.
Annie’s friend LINDA, insists one evening that she be her guest at a local country club function where most of the town’s wealthier and popular citizens are attending a function, where she may meet someone. But where instead she meets Wayne, Jessica & her rich Daddy who are attending as well.
When Annie excuses herself to go to the restroom, she accidentally finds herself in the club’s showers where she learns of Jessica’s infidelity with Donnie. A secret she decides to keep to herself, until later when in a “TWIN PEAKS” kind of moment, Jessica turns up missing, where later her naked and bloated, body is found (wrapped with a heavy chain) and dragged from a swamp near Donnie’s residence.
Her body is found through nightmare visions that Annie has when the police can’t turn up any clues to her whereabouts and ask her for any leads or info she might have heard from her local clientele.
And here the major problem lies. From this point on the story turns into a melodramatic soap-opera murder mystery, which culminates into a big courtroom trial scene involving Annie as a key witness, against Donnie. He’s made a key suspect when another witness ID’s him as having been with Jessica last before her disappearance and Donnie pleads his innocence feeling that Annie has set him up due to his threats.
So it becomes your basic whodunit murder mystery, as you’re left to guess the plot, motives and which character(s), committed the crime, how and why.
It really never culminates into much of a surprise, and the script lacks any real suspense that might have been associated with the final scene, which evidently left me cold, and not really caring about the who did what and why. I’ve seen enough of these kinds of movies and plot twists to have seen it coming too. The physic melodrama is never played up as much as you’d expect either. Annie’s “gift” for having visions is just that, which gets her into the being the catalyst in the murder/courtroom trial plot.
I can’t say though, that I didn’t like the characters. I think Blanchett will do a fabulous job as Annie, and Reeves could do something here as Donnie (I didn’t see one “Whoa” line in the script either). Swank should turn in a good performance as Anita and Holmes should fill the shoes as temptress Jessica just as well.
The interaction between Annie and the other characters were the strongest elements in the story. It only seems to fail, in its unoriginal plot, which is essentially the last half of the script.
We’ll just have to see what kind of “gift” director Raimi can bring us come fall.
‘Til then…
Mysterio checking out for now.
