A television producer thinks he has a brilliant idea for a reality show: Drop off five contestants to the infamous “Camp Blood” and if they can survive the night, they will win a million dollars. They just have to avoid an actor in a clown mask who’s playing the killer. Naturally, the real killer clown bumps off the fake Bozo and starts murdering the contestants for real.
Within the Woods is the third installment of the Camp Blood franchise. I’m not sure why they felt the need to eschew the traditional title route with this one. I guess the title makes sense as the primary rule of the game is that the contestants have to stay “within the woods” to win. Honestly, it really should’ve just been called Camp Blood 3. (Within the Woods was also the title of the film-within-a-film from Part 2.)
No matter what the heck they called it, one thing is for sure, the series had started slowly going downhill at this point. The “killer in a reality show” trope was still relatively new when this was released, but the seams of the subgenre were already starting to show. It doesn’t help that it’s only a slight reworking of the theme from the previous installment. (That one was about someone making a movie about the murders, and in this one they turn it into a TV show.) The gore isn’t quite as good as Part 2 either. (We get throat slashing, an eyeball is popped out, stabbing, a machete through the stomach, and a hand gets chopped off.)
I will say this one is certainly more polished looking than the two entries that preceded it. (Although you can see a few boom mikes in a couple of scenes.) The acting is a tad better too. It’s not nearly as much fun though. Still, Within the Woods is a lot better than many of the cheesy Camp Blood sequels that would follow in the next two(!) decades.
No comments:
Post a Comment