The eighties were apparently a time where summer camps were dens for psychopaths and murderers, and “The Burning” displays no exception. Even more vicious than the first “Friday the 13th,” Tony Maylam’s slasher revenge film is a violent and very creepy horror film steeped in eighties slasher tropes, but still manages to feel fresh and unique to this day. Maylam’s direction keeps the film at a brisk pace, while Tom Savini’s special effects inspire quite the cringe, even today. Cropsey is one of the more underrated slasher icons from the eighties.
He’s another bonafide victim of a cruel prank, that turned him in to a raving lunatic hideously scarred after campers accidentally set him on fire one night. Escaping from a local hospital, he retreats immediately to his old camp, and begins wreaking havoc on a slew of campers, all of whom have left the safe haven of their camp to go on a canoeing trip deep in to the woods. This is where Cropsey begins striking down campers left and right in the most sadistic manner he can muster up. Armed with his hedge clippers, Cropsey is a merciless psycho that spares no victims, and really has a bone to pick with one of the counselors. “The Burning,” much like it similar contemporaries involving summer camps, is very interested in characterization and displaying some sense of build up before spraying the screen red.
Much of the story involves an outcast camper who is consistently bullied by a larger camper, and is anxious to fit in among his kind. Director Maylam then takes the older campers out on the canoeing trip where they remain vulnerable to Cropsey. The mood of the film and the story change drastically by the second half, with director Maylam opting for blood red wipes in to the next scenes, over and over again. This is a real treat, especially after the infamous canoe massacre. It’s a shocking display of gore, sadism, and brilliant editing that I couldn’t quite get past, even when Cropsey finally shows up to confront his last victim with a blow torch. “The Burning” feels like one long campfire tale, and it is very conscious of that, opting on a final scene that’s quite spooky and wonderfully meta. Though it will be compared to the horror film with the hockey masked killer, “The Burning” really works to its own beat, and is a ball from beginning to end.
“Summer Camp Nightmare” is a six minute interview with actress Leah Ayres, as well there is a seven minute series of Behind the Scenes footage, the original theatrical trailer, a two minute make up effects still gallery, and a poster and still gallery. There is an Audio Commentary with Director Tony Maylam and International Film Journalist Alan Jones both of whom don’t take the movie seriously at all, and a second Audio Commentary with Stars Shelley Bruce and Bonnie Deroski whom recall their job on the film and starting out as actors.