Customer Reviews

Campfire Stories

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

Heck, it even has its moments when it borders on being good! "Campfire Stories" (not to be confused with the superior "Campfire Tales") is a new horror anthology that begs to be rented at the very least. The opening could put a jolt through some people, if they`re watching it alone and in the dark, featuring a creepy talking skull introducing the movie you are about to view, but he stays on the screen too long and just becomes stupid. Actually, the only reason the thing is scary to begin with is because it makes you feel like you're about to watch one of those Traces of Death videos everyone talked about with such high respect in grade school. The story he takes you into is that of two young men driving down a deserted road and stopping suddenly at the sight of a young, female traveler (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) standing in their path who also claims to have had car trouble (though her car is nowhere to be seen). The travelers decide to team up and look for help by, of course, wandering into the woods, and this is where they encounter a very unsettling David Johansen playing an oddball character called "Ranger Bill." Ranger Bill is clearly a freak. He instructs the kids to have a seat around a campfire and listen to his stories while they wait for the tow truck to arrive.

The Ranger's first story is about a campus bully who picks on the wrong school groundskeeper. The creepy guy is actually an escaped mental patient who learned a lot about the art of inflicting pain from his even crazier doctor back before he "checked out." After the tedious flashback intro where we see the mental patient being tortured by his doctor until finally escaping, the story begins interestingly enough with the antics of the mean-spirited football players, led by the bully quarterback, causing a stir on the campus lawn and making us think maybe, despite the horrible acting, this might get interesting. Unfortunately, it really doesn't, as the rest of the story consists of the football players running through the forest trying to find the groundskeeper while he is slowly picking them off one by one. That's pretty much all of that story. No real clincher to it. I suppose the end scene in the psychotic groundskeeper's lair is supposed to be shocking, but it really isn't.

At this point I should mention that, since Ranger Bill IS narrating the stories, his voice does come in now and then and pretty much ruin any scariness that might be on the verge of being felt by the viewer. His fake backwoods accent makes it sound like you're watching an old Disney nature story every time his voice interrupts with a comment, usually spewing out something that makes absolutely no sense.

The second story is a tad more creative. Unfortunately, it drags on in the drug-use sequences. The story opens in an old diner in which it seems only the elderly come to eat, except at one table occupied by three hoodlums; two male, one female. Then, in walks an elderly Native-American man. When he leaves, the hoodlums follow, and when they find him sitting outside his trailer smoking something funny, they are dying to take part. The three set out to murder the old man, and they do so, and spend the rest of the night smoking his pipe and hanging out in his trailer. But, when the trip starts to go bad and the CGI snakes start swirling around, it's all downhill from there. The next day, we find our three hoodlums tragically altered by the bad medicine.

Finally, the last story comes around, and this one is pretty good. Okay, maybe it's just another "Scream" or "I Know What You Did Last Summer" rip-off, but I thought it was pretty creative, and it keeps you guessing throughout. The story involves a young girl living in an old house her grandmother left to her, with her very cute, but very unstable roommate. The two have been having some guy troubles and decide to turn the tables on their mischievous boyfriends. Their plan is to humiliate the boys on camera and then post the video on the internet, as they suspected the boys were planning to do to them. But, there are a lot of bad vibes flowing through the old house, and someone is up to more than public humiliation. Trying to figure out who's the real baddie isn't as easy as it seems, even if it probably should have been obvious from the start.

Now, we come to the end of the movie. Ranger Bill has told his stories, and the Tow truck is ready to go. But, of course, this film isn't going to end on a happy note, so someone in the group of weary and frightened travelers is probably not going to make it home alive.

Overall, this movie is bad, no doubt, but it CAN be fun to watch, especially with a group of friends. The acting is bad, of course, and the writing too, though I gotta say that the last story I thought was pretty okay. And, then there's the wraparound story, which I thought had a good little ending to it. No, there's nothing much in this movie that's scary, unless the punk band "The Misfits" freaks you out, but it's still good, sick fun. The only DVD extra is the trailer though, and you'd probably be better off not watching it until after seeing the movie.

others here have told of bad acting, i didnt find it all that terrible, i've certainly seen much worse
i thought there are many parts that are lame, but i dont think the film set out to be the most terrifying thing either, so given that, it does pretty well
like many other movies like this, it has about 4 different short stories that are strung together through the the storytelling of a park ranger
i found each of the stories a little bit too simple and easy to give them much credit in originality, but they at least held my intrest long enough, all in all i'd say worth watching and worth renting if you are looking to watch some campy scary stories, especially if there are youngsters with you, as the stories are not too scary

After a mild berating from a poorly computerized skull, CAMPFIRE STORIES kicks off its trio of terrors with a wrap=around story involving three teens that are stranded in the forest. The kooky Ranger Bill invites them to sit by the fire and enjoy some campfire tales while they wait for their tow truck. In the first story, an insane criminal makes a bloody escape from prison, only to end up the tormented janitor at a local high school twenty years later. It isn't long before he gets revenge on his teen assailants using a variety of gardening accessories! Next up, three teens face an ancient Native American curse after killing an Indian shaman in an attempted robbery. Lastly, four young lovers are targeted by a voyeuristic killer during their drunken party games. Each of the campfire stories are unremarkable in every way possible, barely getting by with its passable acting and filmed on what looks like a hand-held digicam. The only thing that makes it worth watching is for the early performances by television stars Jamie-Lynn Sigler (The Sopranos), John Hensley (Nip/Tuck), Charlie Day and Rob McElhenney (It's Always Sunny in Philidelphia), and pop culture Blogger Perez Hilton. This is otherwise a tired and empty omnibus collection riding on the popularity of late-90's Teen Slashers like I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER and URBAN LEGEND.

-Carl Manes
I Like Horror Movies

My roommates and I rented this movie in college, thinking it would be scary. It was so awful that we were in hysterics for pretty much the whole movie. I think we had to pause it so that we could calm down from laughing. If Mystery Science Theater 3000 was still around(sniff...I miss that show), this would be the PERFECT movie for them to watch. Rent (or buy, the cheapest copy is 29 cents!) this movie if you want to be entertained by just how bad a movie can be.

I never written a review before but I decided that for this movie I should warn people to not even waste their time with this movie. Poorly directed, basically every aspect of the movie is poor. For half of the movie it seemed like they just walked around with a hand held camerea. This movie doesn't even deserve to have one star. I'd rather watch Mariah Carey's Glitter a thousand times than to watch Campfire stories one more time. Please, if you are that curious to see the movie, which I don't even recommend, rent it first.

Hmmm, what to say. First, there's this skull that talks for like fifteen minutes. The movie starts out with these two dorks with a flat tire, and this chick in a skirt flags them on the side of a dirt road. After a little bantering, the chick leads the dorks into the woods to a campfire where that Buster Poindexter guy is sitting. I'm not sure what circumstances there are in which Buster Poindexter could be seen as frightening, but, none the less, he tells everybody to sit down and listen to three poorly-shot, badly written, disjointed tales of horror:

The first story is about a pack of high school football creeps trying to bully the janitor---who just happens to be an escaped mental patient. I think my little sister could take any of these football players in a fight---one at a time or simultaneously. It's really easy to hate and ridicule them. They chase the janitor into the woods, he ends of stalking and killing all but one of them, then the last one, the ring leader, gets pinned down to a chair and ostensibly butchered. This is the kind of crap that wouldn't even make the cut for an episode of Tales From The Darkside.

The second story is the worst, involving three lowlife creeps that like to hang around and roll the old folks. They set their sights on an old Indian, follow him to his place out in the woods. Then they kill him, steal his magic weed and begin smoking it. They have really lame Ronny James Dio type hallucinations, and then, they begin turning old, realizing that the magic weed sucked their life force and put it into the Indian. Blah blah blah. I know it's that literary device where, in the interest of justice, God assumes the form of a greater evil to consume the lesser one. It's cool when it's done correctly, but in this case it was just kind of flaccid.

The last story was really no better than the other two, but it had two fine chicks, a blonde and a brunette, trying to play some kind of high school "get even" prank on their sissy mary boyfriends. It's cool because the chicks get into these leather skirts, but the whole thing really goes nowhere, as the brunette's ghost grandmother starts a miniature killing spree. Mainly just watch this one for the chicks---try to tune everything else out.

Anyway, at the end of the stories, the two dorks and the chick from the beginning get a tow truck, and idiotically enough they find this bar out in the middle of rustic nowhere where's there's some kind of half-baked Misfits cover band on stage. And then you find out they were all in cahoots together, Buster Poindexter, the janitor, the Indian with the evil weed, and the brunette in the leather skirt. Oh boyohboy. I don't know, just watch this if you're bored and in the mood for a bad movie, but don't expect alot. It's not like we're talking Pieces or Burial Ground "The Nights of Terror".

I wouldn't call this the greatest B movie ever made, but it does have it's moments. Such as [low-budget] effects and bad acting. The stories told aren't that bad, with a bigger budget the movie could have given us horror fans justice. But it's based off of the comic book by the same name so it's just a little tribute. the best part of the movie is a cameo the the greatest punk band ever The MISFITS! If you liked the Tales From The Crypt, Creepshow 1 or 2, or Tales From The Darkside check it out. Or in my case bad B-movies, I dug it.

OK Ranger Bill we'll sit down and listen to your "terribly twisted" campfire tales.

Oh dear, where do we start on this one? The tale starts off innocently enough but the quality looks like something that you'd see when you visit your uncle and he wants to show you a video of his son's choir performance. Yikes. Sooner or later, some guys follow this girl into the forest. Hijinks ensues. At this point, one will realize that everyone in this movie was paid by their acting effort as EVERYONE is overacting like it's going out of style. The group finds a creepy ranger who talks in a ridiculous southern drawl and tries to come off as spooky ranger guy but ends up sounding like he's complaining about his belt being cinched too tight and a bad case of diaper rash. He rambles through three different campfire tales. The first tale involves these football players trying to beat up a mental patient. When watching, watch out for the buddies of the main football player. If you aren't careful, their overacting might poke your eyes out. It's amazing. The second tale is actually the worst. If you can make it by the fat guy's ridiculously annoying laugh, check out the horrible effect of the coyote appearing in the fire. Also, there is a 15 minute segment where the camera just goes from person to person as they smoke from this peyote pipe that looks like it was purchased at Indian Inc. in the Santa Fe airport. The third tale is actually not that terrible except for the two high school boys...they look like they're getting paid by the facial expression.

The only reason that we kept watching this movie was to see if it was the worst movie we'd ever seen. The jury is still out, but boy was this one bad.

There is no extra footage nor outtakes on the DVD as it appears that everything was done in one shot. This movie seems like it was cobbled together as an excuse to tell three different unscary campfire tales.

Sure to be a cult classic!

This ranks down there with the worst of the straight-to-video horror movies of recent years. The acting is sub-par, the "campfire stories" are dull and predicatable, and the myriad video camera angles and technqiues border on the nauseating at times (oh, not to mention the worst CGI you'll see this year in the "Indian" story). It's such a waste of time, that there is really nothing at all ever remotely interesting enough to make a comment like "worth seeing for a laugh" or the usual... Just skip it - save your time and money. (yes - it is one of THOSE movies, sorry to say).

Just by way of background, and while other reviewers seems to prefer to reveal much of the story and plot, I think that sort of ruins the film in many cases. So, you'll want to look for other reviews and reviewers if that is what you are looking for...

One of the worst movies I have ever seen. The acting was horrible and that is not too surprising. Kevin Spacey couldn't have delivered these lines convincingly. The only reason I gave it one star is the forrest ranger was creepy. He was the best part of the movie. I like teenage horror flicks, but the only horror for me here was the loss of some hard earned money.