Hell of a Summer

To stand out amid the exhaustive catalog of slasher horror movies, new entries in the subgenre need a hook. Not a literal hook (although that would be a serviceable gimmick), but something to make the familiar material memorable. Maybe it’s the particularly gristly kills and unique first-person presentation in last year’s In a Violent Nature. Perhaps it’s a fun mash-up, like when this year’s Heart Eyes set a masked killer loose in a rom-com scenario or when Freaky (2020) introduced a slasher element into a body swap comedy. Slasher movies often need something extra: a distinct sense of humor, a memorable killer, gory intensity, a genre innovation, a distinct formal style, or ironic self-awareness. Otherwise, they risk looking like cheap knock-offs of their antecedents.

Hell of a Summer is such a movie. Although it has the components of a postmodern horror-comedy, it lacks a memorable hook. That’s not for lack of trying. The duo of Billy Bryk and Finn Wolfhard helm this summer camp yarn about counselors slaughtered by a killer in a devil mask. Bryk and Wolfhard have worked together on multiple projects, from a short film (Night Shift, 2020) to an indie feature (When You Finish Saving the World, 2022), from a blockbuster franchise (Ghostbusters: Afterlife, 2021) to a raucous comedy (Saturday Night, 2024). Together, they wrote, produced, directed, and star in Hell of a Summer, which is almost hook enough itself. Part throwback and part homage, their movie creates the twenty-first-century equivalent of franchises such as Friday the 13th or Sleepaway Camp. 

Set sometime in the 2010s (one character worries about Game of Thrones spoilers), the story follows a group of Camp Pineway counselors who arrive a few days before campers to prepare the lodges, drink irresponsibly, and launch their summer flings. Central is Jason (Fred Hechinger), a bearded twentysomething who proclaimed last year would be his final appearance at Camp Pineway. But he’s back, with an apparent case of arrested development, earning raised eyebrows from his younger counterparts over his earnest belief that camp is “the best place in the world.” Apart from the down-to-earth Claire (Abby Quinn), who’s sporting a crush on Jason (and vice versa), the others occupy the usual tropes: the cool guy (D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai), the prima donna (Pardis Saremi), the theater kid (Matthew Finlan), the goth girl (Julia Lalonde), the contrarian (Daniel Gravelle), the love interest (Krista Nazaire), and the vegan (Julia Doyle), while Bryk and Wolfhard play two neurotic best friends. 

When Jason discovers one of his fellow counselors slain, he attempts to alert the others, who soon realize their cars have been sabotaged and their smartphones stolen. Then, they come to believe Jason is the culprit, and he attempts to prove his innocence. The proceedings include some familiar genre devices: archery, a Ouija board, a campfire, and budding love. Gorehounds may feel disappointed that the kills don’t pack much of a punch, with the rather lame movie maniac resorting to uninspired deaths—that is, apart from the killer exploiting a nut allergy in a memorable scene. This leaves the humor to pick up the slack. However, most of the cast delivers flat comic timing and physical comedy, particularly Wolfhard. Whatever charms he had as the kid from Netflix’s Stranger Things have eluded him as an adult.  

Hechinger fares better, given his experience with masked killers in the Fear Street trilogy. An awkward screen presence who registers somewhere between 13 and 40, Hechinger fits nicely into the role of a counselor who should’ve taken that internship at a law firm over the summer, not returned to his childhood camp. Most of the supporting cast is capable, with Quinn supplying the sole standout. Behind the camera, cinematographer Kristofer Bonnell keeps the visuals coherent, despite the omnipresent darkness. Editors Christine Armstrong and David Marks somehow manage to make the movie’s 88-minute runtime feel longer than it is. Doubtlessly, everyone involved in making this Canadian production struggled to find its hook. 

Slasher aficionados will see that Bryk and Wolfhard, who were in their early twenties when they made this, undoubtedly understand what goes into the genre. But they haven’t added much to the usual formula or deconstructed or reinvented it in a particularly inspired way. Neon picked up the movie a year after its debut at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2023, and the company’s lack of urgency in the acquisition carries over onscreen. It’s as though the young filmmakers have all the components in place but haven’t figured out how to imbue them with electricity, so they tediously cranked the material to life by hand instead of channeling lightning. And while it looks like a fun horror romp, there’s little to distinguish the movie. Hell of a Summer isn’t an incompetent production; it just doesn’t have that extra something that makes it memorable.