An old man all of a sudden pops up looking for warmth from their fire, startling the kids. The movie begins with three kids by a campfire, feels very much like the "Are You Afraid of the Dark" midnight society crew. Three young boys are told four very eerie Campfire Tales by a creepy homeless man who make have a few dark secrets of his own. However, with the movie's charm, you might not notice it after a while. Also, this movie is available on you tube but just to give fair warning, you will have to put up with a software water mark on the screen. PS: Not to be confused with the 1997 version. I'll admit, I'm a sucker when it comes to anthologies (especially now that nobody seems to make them anymore) but if you're like me and you like to see the filmmakers put some effort into their work (especially if they're working on a low budget) then check out "Campfire Tales". Even with the shoe string budget, the film crew manages to do a decent production job with each individual story in the areas of tone, lighting, bizarre music, and (again, considering that this is a low budget movie) very well done makeup. The movie centers around three teenagers who are camping out in the woods when town drunk Ralph (Gunnar Hansen who manages to play the role of storyteller pretty good) tells them four tales: one about a murderer with a hook for a hand, one that is an obvious tribute to "Reefer Madness" (with a more graphic image, mind you), another about Satan Claus (my personal favorite of the bunch), and one about a marooned pirate who learns the price of treachery. And yet, the movie manages to somehow be entertaining. "Campfire Tales" (1991) is no where near being a great horror flick: the acting is- for the most part- not the best and one can clearly see right off the bat that it is a low budget picture. Horror anthology aficionados should dig this. Hansen makes the journey(s) worth taking one might think that as the token "name" actor, that his cost made up a substantial part of the budget, but he proved to be quite reasonable, to the filmmakers' delight. Overall, Cooke and Talbot do a good job with this little film, well worth seeing if slowly paced at times. This segment is pretty talky for a while, but it has a VERY fun payoff. He's determined to unearth whatever treasure may be there, but is warned that he won't be successful if he tries to get off the island. Finally, "Skull and Crossbones" is a solid, atmospheric tale of a pirate shipwrecked on an island. As you can expect, the ending is very satisfying. "The Fright Before Xmas" has the appeal of a "just desserts" sort of yarn, as a resentful, greedy son experiences his own consequences of a murderous act. stuff that has dire consequences when ingested. Two stoners come into contact with a supplier who gives them some VERY strange stuff indeed. It's decent, but is basically just a warm-up for the tales to follow. "The Hook" is pretty standard stuff about a couple who run afoul of the title maniac. This little film was the product of the imagination of William Cooke and Paul Talbot (if the second name rings a bell, it's because he's a Charles Bronson expert who's written books and recorded commentaries for a number of Bronson vehicles). It gets pretty damn disgusting at certain points, so it will appeal to gore fanatics, and the stories are entertaining and succinctly told. He proceeds to spin a quartet of horror tales, and for the most part, they're actually pretty entertaining this little film does live up to the word "horror". Horror icon Gunnar "Leatherface" Hansen is on hand in this horror anthology, as he essays the role of Ralph, a rough-hewn stranger who materializes out of the night before three young male campers.
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