Cannibal Campout (1988)

You axed for it

"Cannibal Campout" is an ultra low-budget, straight-to-video, shot-on-video feature with your everyday college students camping in the woods pitted against a few degenerates who have an acquired sweet tooth for debauchery and human flesh. If it sounds like the typical '80s slasher met some cliche backwoods folks, then you wouldn't be very far off the mark.

This is purposely campy and as a saving grace sometimes humorous as a result. This has self-degradation in the form of outright parodying another movie--Friday the 13th, Halloween, Texas Chainsaw, even Top Gun--to being whimsical on its own with certain lines and out-there villains. The music ranges from simple melodies to random keys in a desperate attempt to spice up the not-so-scary mood and paper-thin story line. The acting fluctuates between wooden line reading to nearly pulling off that character. Richard Marcus' character is hands down the most effective due to this kind of crackbrained eccentricity that's in the vein of Chop-Top. There's blood and guts shown mostly in full view instead of the camera pulling away like in a number of "Friday the 13th" sequels due to censor boards.

You can't expect much from these lost, need-an-extensive-map-to-find-'em '80s pictures except to get some kind of brief entertainment or nostalgic value. This could have been cut in half to make an effective short, as there's not much to fall back on as a viewer between all the walking-in-the-woods filler except so many death scenes and some tongue-in-cheek quirkiness that can soon be forgotten after it's over.

Rating: 3/10

From Black and Red recommends instead: "Mother's Day." This is another low-budget flick centered in the backwoods with a couple of sadisitc degenerates tormenting unsuspecting victims. It has a dark sense of humor and scenes worth going back to.

Stars: Jon McBride, Amy Chludzinski, Christopher A. Granger, Richard Marcus
Link: IMDB