Camp Cold Brook

It was long ago when I stumbled upon "Camp Cold Brook" , thought the poster's cool and it's produced by Joe Dante, so it has been sitting on my watchlist for a year or two. Now that it has finally come out, I can officially say that I'm disappointed.

"Camp Cold Brook" is an undeniably eventful and effortful piece of horror - we follow Jack (Chad Michael Murray) and his paranormal team of the show "Haunt Squad" as they find themselves making their hopefully game-changing new episode on the grounds of an abandoned summer camp where a mass murder has taken place years ago. It might seem that the found-footage shtick might be in use, but it's not, just minimalistically. It's still a classic, (at this point) conventional story & to spice it up, the filmmakers mixed it up with... one or two other conventional story lines. The twists are largely predictable, the characters are one-dimensional and the action - bland. "Camp Cold Brook" has very little flair, even less originality, but a lot of effort for the cliché's and cheese, which I personally can't give much props for. The acting performances are fine, albeit clothed up in uninspiring characters, genre fans will likely appreciate seeing Danielle Harris. The cinematographer has really tried to make "Camp Cold Brook" aesthetically enjoyable, dynamic, but on the background of other flaws, it eventually wore itself out or, in other words, ceased to impress.

"Camp Cold Brook" is a horror movie for those less experienced in the genre, for it utilizes old tropes, cheap technical solutions and bland story arcs. It has little to none gore or sexuality, so I'd assume teenagers can a get a kick or two out of this. My rating: 4/10.

Run of the mill camp suspense movie that we've seen 100 times before.

Once again here we go with a movie that had such possibilities but ended up being a total pile of garbage. LOVE Danielle Harris but even she could not save this movie. I gave it a 5 just because of her. They could have taken this ghost story to such awesome levels but left it totally flat. Not sure what is happening with Hollywood these days.......someone just seems to wake up one morning and say "hey, lets make a horror movie today but let's not think it through let's just go for it and see what happens"..........

Jack Wilson (Chad Michael Murray) is the star of the paranormal show, Haunt Squad. Angela (Danielle Harris) is his costar. They are getting canceled. It's time to go big or go home. They are given one more show to turn things around. They head to Camp Cold Brook. There was a murder spree in the past and no one has ever investigated the site.

The premise is kinda cheesy. This does have CMM and Danielle Harris. With only four characters, the kill potential is limited. Nothing happens for far too long. It's only the last fifteen minutes when it does anything. By then, it's too late. It's not anything that scary anyways.

This is well acted. Everyone involved did a pretty good job of getting into their parts, and I appreciate it greatly when actors make the effort. It's what they should be doing and speaks well of them as professionals. I give them all kudos and frankly it's the only reason I rank this a 5 out of 10.

This is well filmed, it has that quality you hope to find in a movie when you view one: clear video, steady cameras, good story-boarding.

Unfortunately that's it. Plot wise it was very unoriginal. It's been done before by only, oh I don't know.. 60 or 70 other movies? I'm being facetious of course, but seriously, it's been done before. The plot was so stale that I was able to guess the ending almost immediately after the first hint was passed out. The second I heard, "28 children died" BOOM! I knew exactly what the ending was going to be. I also guessed the part about the co-worker. I won't spoil it, though trust me there isn't much to be spoiled. It was so predictable.

Additionally I felt like there were some real holes. Many of the scenes in the film were cliches from other movies, but some of them were left somewhat uncooked. This happens mainly in the supporting characters. They'll say something like (loose paraphrase to avoid spoiler) "You know what we did!" And then we never find out what they did. Lol.

As far as being scared goes, there is little to scare you. The special effects are limited (thankfully) and when they do appear they are not terribly effective.

I think the biggest problem is that there is a very discernible lack of focus. Is this a scary movie? It's not that scary. Is it a mystery? It's too easy to guess. Is it a comedy, nope. Is this about the (NON-SPOILER CHARACTER) or the other (NON-SPOILER CHARACTER)? Maybe neither? It felt as though the intent of the film kept changing somewhere in the middle. All told, it just didn't fly with me.