Sometimes your reasons for watching something can be pretty silly. With Party Camp it was a simple three of them: 1) Billy Jacoby is in it and he's stolen many a scene in flicks like Just One of the Guys and Bloody Birthday, 2) Jewel Shepard also appears and will more than likely lose some clothing, and 3) It was directed by Gary Graver who not only had a friendship with Orson Welles but also has a huge resume making b-movies as well as being involved in the porn industry. Those three things were enough for me to pop the VHS into the machine and get ready to revisit a 80s sex comedy I really couldn't remember anything about. And it certainly starts out as a 80s flick as we're treated to a dream sequence where Jerry (Andrew Ross) is floating in a pool while being surrounded by bikini-clad girls while a porny saxophone plays on in the background.

Welcome to Camp Chipmunk. It's your typical summer camp filled with all the clichéd characters you'd expect. There's the cleavage showing Nurse Brenda (April Wayne, who you expect to get naked right away), the militaristic owner "Sarge" (Peter Jason), studly jock Tad (Kirk Cribb), the dream girl Heather (Kerry Brennan), and the hyperactive motor mouth Dyanne (Shepard). Jerry's taken a job there as a counsellor and, of course, gets stuck looking after the cabin filled with the outcasts and losers. This means a whole lot of scenes of Jerry and his charges getting into mischief, a bunch of running jokes, a few mild chuckles courtesy of a weightlifting scene packed with sexual innuendos and a strip poker scene involving Dyanne and some slasher movie spoofing, and a finale that pits "jocks vs. dweebs" in an obstacle course race that seemingly goes on forever while crazy guitar riffs blast on the soundtrack. It's also worth mentioning some running narration from a random Hunter S. Thompson cribbing camp employee that has no real purpose at all.

As written by Paul Brown (Thrashin'), Party Camp is basically a low-budget take-off of Meatballs and its ilk only with an R-rated spin. This is probably why it feels so strung together. The script generally clones scenes from other, more successful, movies and tosses them into the mix - the most obvious victim being Revenge of the Nerds with the hidden camera moments and race finale a direct swipe. However, if you're into drinking games you could have some fun slamming one back every time the word "party" is spoken.

In the lead, Ross (in his only film role) isn't that bad with all his wannabe swagger but he's upstaged by a few of his co-stars. Character actor Jason, who has over 200 credits(!), has a few dopey moments as the camp's matriarch and Kevin Telles steals a few scenes as the gun crazy Ferris but the flick really belongs to Shepard. Having made an impression on my young mind with Return of the Living Dead and Hollywood Hot Tubs she's playing a variation on the California valley girl persona she's done before and is actually pretty droll - even though we're really just waiting for her to get topless most of the time. Jacoby, as D.A., has his typical smirk (which is one of the main reasons I dig his 80s work) but isn't given quite enough screen time. Unfortunately Wayne doesn't doff her duds but it is worth noting she'd end up marrying co-star Jacoby.

Party Camp doesn't try too hard to be more than a cliché and it's low-budget does tend to show but it's definitely not the worst summer camp comedy I've seen (that title might belong to Gorp). That being said, it's also not really worth checking out unless you have some of the agendas I had going in. It's pretty forgettable and its slapdash nature of humour does get a little tiring but I got enough amusement out of it that it wasn't a total wash. (Chris Hartley, 9/21/14)

Directed By: Gary Graver.
Written By: Paul Brown.

Starring: Andrew Ross, Kerry Brennan, Dean R. Miller, Billy Jacoby.