It happens to many of us above a certain age. You wake up one day, and realize that your life involves neither your childhood besties, nor the carefree bliss you once took for granted. With that in mind, Castille Landon’s wearisome comedy “Summer Camp” ponders, what if there was a way to awaken our inner child and reestablish our priorities later in life through some fun and play? It’s surely a worthy enough premise for a good time, but one “Summer Camp” squanders through dull jokes, an uninspiring story without any real stakes and an overall phony feeling that the film can’t shake.
Indeed, “Summer Camp” often seems only as authentic as a high-end glamping site, when it unsuccessfully tries to convince the audience that it’s the real deal about the virtues of letting your hair down once in a while — a teaching that the film hammers on, but doesn’t take to heart itself. But it at least has an iconic cast at its disposal. Kathy Bates, Alfre Woodard and Diane Keaton play childhood friends Ginny, Mary and Nora, a trio so stuck in their jobs and day-to-day battles that they barely get to see each other anymore, decades after being BFFs and bunkmates at a camp every summer.
Well, that is more the fault of some than others. As the narrator of the story, Ginny — a successful self-help personality with a book series called “Get Your sh*t Together” — desperately tries and tries to get the band back together. But the unhappily married busy nurse Mary has too hectic an existence to commit to any plans. And Nora, a well-heeled scientist of some sort, just seems to prefer the predictability of her workaholic lifestyle. Thankfully, an unmissable opportunity presents itself and the three pals find themselves heading to a reunion week at the very summer camp that once sealed their lifelong friendship. But there are of course some changes at the site. For starters, what used to be the girls’ reliably rustic cabin is now an over-the-top, Instagram-ready design mecca, touched by Ginny’s personal friend Martha. (Yes, the Stewart one.) And the boys they were once at war with are now handsome, successful men — the likes of Eugene Levy’s Stevie and Dennis Haysbert’s Tommy.
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There are breadcrumbs throughout “Summer Camp” that invite analogies to the lovely 1995 coming-of-age flick “Now and Then” — still the rarest of female friendship films — and even last year’s wonderful “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” Another obvious reference point that crops up often is 2018’s “Book Club,” a functional enough comedy that nonetheless has a thing or two to say about the challenges aging women face in life, work, sex and friendships. Unsurprisingly, these comparisons only further illuminate the charms that “Summer Camp” lacks. For one thing, it’s pretty hard to care about these grown-ups’ camp reunion when the film (unlike “Now and Then”) doesn’t bother to engage with their childhood era in any real way, giving us only a short glimpse into what life used to be like for Ginny, Mary and Nora in their younger years.
Perhaps more troublingly, “Summer Camp” doesn’t bother with any sort of character development for the mature Ginny, Mary and Nora that feels real. In that, their chats about marriage vs. independence, and jokes about sex (and remote-control vibrators) just fall flat. It’s almost as if Landon has worked out of a checklist of topics these women would hypothetically discuss, rather than thought through what any of these conversations might emotionally mean for a later-in-life coming-of-age tale. One effort to give one of the women — namely Nora — some character arc through a makeover session looks especially comical, even confusing. Imagine Diane Keaton already wearing the most Diane Keaton-y of costumes — crisp high-neck shirts, tailored blazers, thick belts and Annie Hall hats — and only ending up in another signature Keaton look after the makeover.
Among the three, only Mary’s story hits some deep notes and Woodard is memorable when “Summer Camp” gives her the space to explore her dilemmas as a woman who gave up on her career goals only to be stuck in a loveless marriage with a selfish man. But any potential good that might come out of that thread rapidly gets overpowered by bad running gags (scenes with Betsy Sodaro’s Vick as an unhinged camp operative especially feels repetitive), tiresome camp hijinks and a half-hearted twist about the self-assured Ginny.
From the star-studded cast to the crew, those involved in the “Summer Camp” production probably had an amazing time hanging out at the working summer camp in Hendersonville, North Carolina, the idyllic location where the film was shot. But somehow, we’re never let in on the fun.
