CHEERLEADER CAMP

Cheerleader Camp Movie Review

A group of cheerleaders at a summer camp are killed one by one. Ah yes, the simplicity of a 1980's camp slasher film--how I miss these! This one actually came out at the tail-end of the run of this sub-genre (1988), but for the most part, it has the look and feel of similar movies from the 1970's and early 1980's. The movie also looks and feels a lot like some of the 1980's beach comedies we all used to watch on USA's Up All Night back in the day (minus Rhonda Shear, sadly). There are even a couple familiar faces in this one--Buck Flower (Back to the Future, Pumpkinhead) plays a creepy dude. 1970's idol Leif Garrett (The Outsiders, Devil Times Five) plays the guy all the girls want. Teri Weigel, a personal favorite of my buddy Jeff back in our high school days (I still don't see it, man) pops in to play the, ahem, "friendly" girl. Finally, our lead girl is played by Betsy Russell, who you know as Jigsaw's wife in the Saw franchise. Not only did she surprise me by playing a likable lead, but seeing her pre-plastic was...weird.

This is her...I couldn't believe it either

This movie doesn't really bring a lot we haven't seen before, but that's okay, as I don't think anybody expects it to. As I referenced earlier, there is quite a bit of comedy in this; it's more than most similar movies have, but some of it is actually kind of funny, so we can excuse it. Most of the death scenes are standard 80's slasher stuff, with the possible exception of the scene with the hedge shears--that one is quite memorable. Overall, the acting is slightly better I expected it to be, though Weigel is dreadfully bad, and one gets the sense Garrett knew his star had all but burned out by this time. Lucinda Dickey, the star of my favorite movie title to say out loud (Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo), really steals the show as Cory, the bullied mascot. The movie is a bit of a whodunit, and the end offers a nice little twist. While Cheerleader Camp isn't a movie I would tell anybody to run out and find, if you do happen across it, I say give it a shot--I was pleasantly surprised by it. 

On A Scale Of One To Ten: 6

Cheerleader Camp Movie Trailer