Camp Utopia

May 23, 2005

Rated: NR Runtime: 81 min Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Camp Utopia starts with an interesting concept: it’s 1969, and charismatic guru Timothy Bach (played by former RATT frontman Stephen Pearcy) starts a small hippie commune in the woods. All the hippies are dancing and having fun. Some of the women are topless. And they’re all far off in the woods away from the rest of us, so that’s fine by me. But then Bach takes a hit of bad acid. He grabs a machete and starts slaughtering the hippies, especially the fat ones. This movie had FIVE STARS written all over it.

Camp Utopia But then the movie flash-forwards to the present time, and we get stuck with another “teens in the woods” movie. Two guys and three girls head out to the woods for a camping trip, but they’re “roughing it”, so no cell phones are allowed. I will give the filmmakers credit for at least addressing that issue. Everyone carries a cell phone these days.

Turns out they’re setting up camp on the exact spot where Bach killed all those hippies back in ‘69. Since one of the three girls is new to town, the legend of Camp Utopia is rehashed again, and we learn that Bach disappeared into the woods, never to be found.

The bumbling Ranger Rogers (Adam Minoravich) shows up once or twice as comic relief, but this movie really needed a few more laughs. Normally that wouldn’t be a problem with bad actors whose “dramatic line readings” wind up being hilarious.

But the five teen characters were decent actors, and sadly, the story and script weren’t decent enough to match the actors. The movie just feels too serious to really kick back and enjoy.

I would like to commend two of the three female leads for taking their tops off in scenes where nudity was necessary to the story. It is a credit to both their talent and their devotion to their craft that they would so completely invest themselves in their characters. Thank you, Jessica and Sarah. Alexandra keeps her top on, but she delivers an excellent scene at the end, so she is forgiven this time around.

Even though it would have benefited from having a bit more “camp”, Camp Utopia is worth a spin in your DVD player.

Posted by Chris Terranova | Filed Under 3 Stars, Alexandra Westmore, Collin Stark, DVD, Drama, Horror, James Foley, Jessica Jordan, NR, Sarah Megan White