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Billboard Women in Music 2025
In two decades at Variety, I have reviewed precious few slasher movies. Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t take much pleasure in what Roger Ebert called “dead teenager movies” — and yet, for some reason, this week I am writing about three (and no, that’s not an April Fool’s joke). The clearest explanation I can point to is the fact that, at a time of considerable economic uncertainty in the film industry, horror movies are performing better than ever: They’re cheap, they’re profitable and they consistently draw audiences without the cost of a massive marketing campaign.
Neon has been smart with “Hell of a Summer,” a summer camp slasher comedy the genre-savvy distributor picked up late last summer, nearly a year after it premiered in Midnight Madness at the Toronto Film Festival. The movie’s hella derivative, but still quite entertaining, with an appealing cast and memorable characters (especially “Thelma” star Fred Hechinger as a 24-year-old who can’t seem to get enough of Camp Pineway). Most signficantly, it marks the feature directing debut of “Stranger Things” star Finn Wolfhard and fellow actor Billy Bryk, who hit it off on the set of “Ghostbusters: Afterlife.”
The folks at Neon know this movie is the umpteenth variation on an old formula — 13 counselors show up at Pineway, not realizing someone wants them all dead — but the movie is the real deal (in that it plays well to audiences), and the filmmakers have a following, so Neon took the duo on the road for two weeks of early in-person screenings to build word of mouth among their fans. I had a free night recently and snapped up a ticket for what proved to be a sold-out show, and right from the opening scene, I felt something different.
From the skinny-dipping shark attack in “Jaws” to witnessing a murder through a 6-year-old’s eyes in “Halloween,” so much depends on the first fatalities in films like these. Such scenes tell us what kind of filmmakers we’re dealing with and set the tone for what’s to come. What impressed me in this case weren’t the “kills” (which are indeed creative and designed to amuse more than terrify), but the way the co-directors managed to sketch a pair of likable contemporary characters — a young couple teasing one another by the lake — before dispatching them.
Now, I’ve been on earth as long as Wolfhard and Bryk put together, and yet, these two have clearly seen more slasher movies than me. I’d actually put off watching “Friday the 13th” until last year, when researching Variety’s 100 Best Horror Movies of All Time list forced me to check it out … even if the film didn’t make the cut. By contrast, the young filmmakers have not only seen but internalized that movie and so many of its imitators, to the point that they can both quote and subvert the codes — from Jay McCarrol’s catchy electronic score (a hat tip to John Carpenter) to the postmodern killer-as-pop-culture-addict meta-critique screenwriter Kevin Williamson brought to “Scream,” etc.
An early shot, spying from the killer’s POV behind some bushes, is an overt homage to “Friday the 13th.” And it can be no coincidence that Hechinger plays a guy named Jason, whose mother questions whether he should move on with his life, as opposed to returning once again to Pineway, where he’s spent so many summers, first as a camper, and later as a counselor. That’s how desperate Jason is to cling to his happy place — although the next 24 hours could prove traumatic enough to finally snap him out of his perpetual adolescence. Hechinger is the perfect choice for the role, bringing just the right of optimism and obliviousness to an endearingly pathetic dork who finds the opportunity to be heroic.
When the couple whom we see killed in the opening scene fail to show at camp, Jason steps up and takes charge of the 10 other counselors, none of whom take their jobs even half as seriously as he does. They’re too busy flirting and fussing over who’s in which cabin and what to do about their dietary restrictions — all of which is just the right amount of aggravating, leaving audiences half-rooting for the killer to deal with the peskier counselors.
Among these potential victims, Wolfhard plays Chris, a sensitive gender studies major who’s more evolved than the Cro-Magnons who typically populate such films. Aspiring influencer Demi (Pardis Saremi) doesn’t want to surrender her cell phone. Flamboyant theater geek Ezra (Matthew Finlan) makes his shrieks sound especially dramatic. Shannon (Krista Nazaire) and Claire (Abby Quinn) seem tough enough to fend for themselves. Meanwhile, desperately horny Bobby (Bryk) is determined to hook up, taking it personally that he hasn’t been murdered when he figures out the kill list is ordered from hottest to most homely.
The attacks themselves are staged mostly for our benefit, causing a few plot holes in the process (if we don’t see a murder, there’s a good chance it didn’t happen … but then what reason do the characters have to assume it did?). That also explains why the culprit sports a red devil costume: to prevent audiences from identifying them too early. Wolfhard and Bryk keep us guessing — and laughing — and though everything from axes to pocket knives serve as weapons, the most memorable cuts come from editors Christine Armstrong and David Marks, who mask the low budget while creatively transitioning between scenes.
