{"id":13055,"date":"2014-03-26T10:40:11","date_gmt":"2014-03-26T17:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qgp.ykq.mybluehost.me\/cinephiled\/?p=13055"},"modified":"2014-03-26T10:40:11","modified_gmt":"2014-03-26T17:40:11","slug":"found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Found-Footage &#8216;Happy Camp&#8217; Can&#8217;t Find the Right Ending"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Cinematic history is littered with the remains of films that failed to conclude in satisfactory fashion. That\u2019s especially true of horror, a genre that relies, nay depends, on strong endings.<\/p>\n<p>Even such recent(ish) horror hits as <i>The Blair Witch Project<\/i> (1999) and <i>Paranormal Activity<\/i> (2007) couldn\u2019t come up with well-done third acts or the kind of resolutions to send their audiences home completely happy \u2013 or completely freaked out. (In fact, the latter had its ending changed for its widescreen release, at the behest of producer Steven Spielberg. And ironically, his 1975 classic <i>Jaws<\/i> has critics who believe the film is much better through its first two acts, before the title character finally emerges. But that\u2019s another story for another day.)<\/p>\n<p>Getting back to the subject at hand, you can\u2019t really blame <i>Happy Camp<\/i> for failing in that regard as well. Like <i>Blair Witch<\/i> and the first <i>Paranormal<\/i>, this horror-thriller does generate a few scares in innovative ways, mostly through use of the \u201cfound-footage\u201d gimmick, which is saying something, given how done-to-death that contrivance has become.<\/p>\n<p>And refreshingly, at 75 minutes, it doesn\u2019t even linger too long. That turns out to be a good thing, since audiences probably don\u2019t want to give its somewhat messy finale any real thought &#8212; at least not if they\u2019re going to look back upon the movie in a favorable light.<\/p>\n<p>The low-budget, fairly-no-frills effort comes from director, co-scripter and co-star Josh Anthony and some of his actor\/producer\/writer pals, who set their tale in the title town, a real-life logging community that\u2019s located in northern California\u2019s Klamath National Forest.<\/p>\n<p>Using fake news footage and other filmic re-creations, <i>Happy Camp<\/i> at least tries to tell the story of Michael Tanner (Michael Barbuto), a thirty-something who\u2019s still haunted by the mysterious disappearance of his adopted brother, Dean, more than 20 years earlier.<\/p>\n<p>The boy was abducted and never found, a similar fate that was shared by a startling number of Happy Camp residents. So Michael returns to the scene of the crime, with the help of his friends Josh (Anthony), Teddy (Teddy Gilmore) and Anne (Anne Taylor), all of whom come bearing questions as well as a digital video camera to record their experiences.<\/p>\n<p>As you\u2019d expect, the remaining Happy Camp residents aren&#8217;t exactly thrilled to see them, or to answer their seemingly pesky questions. And once the quartet investigates the nearby woods, they start hearing and seeing all sorts of mysterious noises and presences.<\/p>\n<p>You have to give the filmmakers some points for one thing: They\u2019re smart enough to know that have to lighten the mood with occasional humor, and these interludes are very welcome. Otherwise, the film would have quickly become laughable and silly, though the aforementioned ending may give a few viewers a case of the giggles.<\/p>\n<p>But Anthony and company do set a proper mood, aided by the dark, mysterious forest atmospherics. And the production values are solid, for the most part, despite the obvious shoestring budget. (While Drew Barrymore and producing partner Nancy Juvonen have their names on the film through their Flower Films production company, it\u2019s clear this wasn&#8217;t a pricey investment.)<\/p>\n<p><i>Jeff Michael Vice can also be heard reviewing films, television programs, comics, books, music and other things as part of The Geek Show Podcast (<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thegeekshowpodcast.com\/\"><i>www.thegeekshowpodcast.com<\/i><\/a><i>), and can be seen reviewing films as part of Xfinity\u2019s Big Movie Mouth-Off (<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BigMovieMouthOff\"><i>www.facebook.com\/BigMovieMouthOff<\/i><\/a><i>).<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Cinematic history is littered with the remains of films that failed to conclude in satisfactory fashion. That\u2019s especially true of horror, a genre that relies, nay depends, on strong endings. Even such recent(ish) horror hits as The Blair Witch Project (1999) and Paranormal Activity (2007) couldn\u2019t come up with well-done third acts or the kind [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":13057,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[1538,1536,1022,22,536,1539,270,1537,75],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Review: Found-Footage &#039;Happy Camp&#039; Can&#039;t Find the Right Ending - Cinephiled<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Review: Found-Footage &#039;Happy Camp&#039; Can&#039;t Find the Right Ending - Cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Cinematic history is littered with the remains of films that failed to conclude in satisfactory fashion. That\u2019s especially true of horror, a genre that relies, nay depends, on strong endings. Even such recent(ish) horror hits as The Blair Witch Project (1999) and Paranormal Activity (2007) couldn\u2019t come up with well-done third acts or the kind [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BigMovieMouthOff\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-03-26T17:40:11+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/happy-camp-photo.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"315\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeff Michael Vice\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@JeffMichaelVice\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeff Michael Vice\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/\",\"name\":\"Review: Found-Footage 'Happy Camp' Can't Find the Right Ending - Cinephiled\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/happy-camp-photo.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-03-26T17:40:11+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-03-26T17:40:11+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#\/schema\/person\/4a40f2c344ca429bd78eb836b98847bf\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/happy-camp-photo.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/happy-camp-photo.jpg\",\"width\":560,\"height\":315},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/found-footage-happy-camp-cant-find-right-ending\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Review: Found-Footage &#8216;Happy Camp&#8217; Can&#8217;t Find the Right Ending\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/\",\"name\":\"Cinephiled\",\"description\":\"Movie Reviews, Interviews and Analysis for Film Lovers\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#\/schema\/person\/4a40f2c344ca429bd78eb836b98847bf\",\"name\":\"Jeff Michael Vice\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/df298a98bd693bea56d0730dd55517bc?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/df298a98bd693bea56d0730dd55517bc?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"caption\":\"Jeff Michael Vice\"},\"description\":\"Utah-based movie writer and all-around smart aleck Jeff Michael Vice can be read reviewing films, television programs, comics, books, music and other things for the Big Shiny Robot! 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