At last summer is bidding us farewell. The buggy hot days are
shifting ever more towards long cool nights. It's the sort of
transition that warms the hearts of us holiday lovers. We're
approaching the final four months of the year. The ones
scientifically proven to be the best. That being said we still have
to deal with the lingering threads of summertime be it the
deconstruction of back-to-school aisles or the sounds of the last
rodeo. Keeping that change in mind I thought it'd be nice to kick off
the Halloween coverage this year with something that straddles the
seasons. As luck would have it the thrift store provided just such a
topic with one weird, and free, VHS tape from Golden Book Media
Productions called Campfire Thrillers. Dunno about you all but
I'm down for thirty minutes of summer camp kids hearing spooky
stories from a what appears on the cover to be a meth-head with magic
powers. Won’t you join me?
As expected this
tape begins with a title card reading Campfire Thrillers but
then the title switches to Tallow Glee and the Golden
Key. Before we have time to accuse Golden Books of a bait and
switch we're treated to some nice moody scenery of a camp at night.
Owls hoot as the sunset glistens on the waves of a wooded lake,
classic stuff. Then the narration starts with some guy thinking back
on a special night at camp though he speaks with as much excitement
as someone on their sixth drink of the evening. That special night in
question was the night he would visit a place somewhere between
dreams and reality that would change him forever. In reality it’s
just a campsite occupied by a strange man.
Inside a cabin we
meet what are presumably going to be our core protagonists. First up
is Randy, a blonde lil shit who I'd usually call out as the bully of
the picture if the story were so inclined as to include actual
conflict. Honestly he’s more of an honorable turd than any sort of
threat. Then we have Danny who's obsessed with proving the legend of
Tallow Glee to be true. When asked who tallow Glee is Danny responds
that everyone knows who he is, the greatest storyteller ever.
Obviously not everyone knows that if you're being asked about it.
Maybe spend your summer brushing up on deductive reasoning, Danny.
Finally we have our narrator, Pete. Poor lil Pete is, for lack of a
better word, a bit of a puss. Just the notion of going out into the
woods in search of a legendary figure freaks this kid out. Total L 7
weeny right here. He falls in line quickly enough to follow Danny and
another kid who can feel something pulling them towards the woods.
Randy follows for lack of anything better to do.
Everyone meets at a
nearby totem pole including a few girls from what Danny calls “the
other camp” (such world building). Everyone works out some National
Treasure style puzzle based on following the gaze of the fourth
totem mask towards a clearing in settler's woods. Pete tries to duck
out since he fears getting in trouble, ugh this kid, until Randy
shames him into following along.
After being treated
to an exciting montage of children fumbling their way through the
woods they at last find the mythical clearing which looks more like a
forgotten campsite. Ever the optimist Randy declares this all to be
nonsense. Of course religious zealot Danny knows there's a special
way to call Tallow Glee. Wouldn't ya know a nearby rock has
instructions to hoot at owls and howl at wolves until shazam! Some
dude who looks like Moses appears. This guy speaks almost entirely in
rhyme and pulls fire from his sack, all vital signs to run in terror.
Along with fire he has a magic box that emits a startling amount of
smoke. Furthermore Tallow Glee dodges questions like a purebred
politician. When asked where he comes from he responds with something
like “a place older than time and younger than today.” The shit
does that mean? Does it simply sound more mystical than admitting you
spent the whole night at Buddy Ray’s Wing Shack off highway 3? The
kids switch tactics to asking about the magical smoking box. A girl
named Betsy is especially notable for asking “what’s in the box?”
with just enough urgency to give me flashbacks to Seven.
Tallow's whole
pitch revolves around using a key to open the doors of this magic box
in order to experience tales of all kinds. None of the kids are fool
enough to volunteer though they are daft enough to join in a
ritualistic ceremony as the key magically teleport around them. Guess
who gets the honor of story one? Pete the puss is on the case.
At last it's time
for our first tale. Things shift here as all of Tallow Glee’s
stories are presented via some very crude animation. Glee is also
responsible for providing all the voices which hits the highest peak
of absurdity whenever he pretends to be a young girl. As for this
first tale; it's about two brothers who've recently moved to a house
with an accompanying ghost story of a young man who drowned and whose
dog disappeared soon after. Quite the coincidence as the brothers
adopt a wild dog they name Stranger who my be supernatural in origin.
Honestly it's a pretty lite affair that at best would have made for a
moderate episode of Are You Afraid of
the Dark? While there is admittedly some supernatural elements at
play I’m not convinced this qualified as a thriller. For making
these kids suffer humiliation and the perils of a moonlight forest,
Glee is really giving out some lackluster rewards. It seems enough to
make Pete stop whining so that's a plus.
Who deserves the
second tale? Ah who cares about deserve? Randy demands the next story
be something scary so Tallow Glee gives him the next crack at his
magic box. This second offering concerns a lonely old cat lady
waiting for a birthday call from her daughter. When the phone rings
she's shocked to be threatened with a forthcoming visit by a raspy
man who calls himself The Viper. The calls continue to escalate until
it is revealed that the Viper is actually a small immigrant window
washer with a bad accent. The old lady either passes out or suffers a
massive infarction for her fear of foreigners. Can’t tell you how
many times I heard this tale as a kid so nothing here was a surprise.
Randy seems satisfied enough cause it's time for someone else to get
a story.
With Pete having
already learned his lesson and Randy the dick bullying his way into
the spotlight, who will get the third and final tale of the night?
One might imagine Danny seeing as he's been an unwavering follower of
Tallow Glee this whole time, suffering humiliation, bullying, and
getting in trouble with authority figures just to seek this legend.
Kid has bled for this. Clearly his slavish devotion should result in
him finally being the recipient of a tale. Or maybe will just give it
to Betsy… you know, that girl who's had like one line in the whole
damn tape. I get it, and I agree, one of the girls deserves a story
but Danny's has got to be fuming after Randy got one instead of him.
General rule of storytelling is not to set up a long-held obsession
for a character only for it to go unfulfilled.
Let's talk about
this last tale though. Despite this tape being called Campfire
Thrillers, so far there has been much more silly rhymes and
pyromania than any distinct thrills. Well it turns out for how
unassuming Betsy may be she's clearly done something to earn the most
outright grim tale of the bunch. Good on you sister.
This final
installment revolves around sisters Veronica and Jessica. They live
with their mother and younger brother in a fine harbor town brimming
with business. One day some peddlers, cough’ gypsies, come to their
home to make a sale yet mom can't afford anything. The peddlers
daughter takes an apple from the family tree causing one of the
sisters to start yelling at her. Later on the girls spy on the
peddlers camp where they discover his daughter has the power to make
her toys come alive via a special flute. The sisters offer to do
anything for this flute so the peddlers daughter sends them on a
series of crude errands like stealing from their mother, or
collecting her tears. The final request is to look into a mirror and
give up twenty happy years. When the girls return home with their
non-functioning magic flute they find their brother is a swole ass
man and their mother is a broken spinster haunted by the memory of
her children who ran away. The pair is left crying, aged, and
forgotten on their porch denied love by their own family. Someone
should really tell old Tallow Glee to ramp up his stories more
carefully. Guy went from a lighter episode of Alfred
Hitchcock Presents to Rosemary's Baby in a matter of
minutes.
With that third
tale Tallow calls it a night. The children wonder when he might
return though as usual he responds with more nonsense and riddles.
Accepting that their hero is likely wandering off to the nearest
Denny’s to load up on carbs and breakfast links the children let it
slide. The wise and mystical storytelling bides his audience farewell
before walking towards the tress and fading away. With his absence
the fire disappears and the kids freak out and split. Personally I’d
have preferred the mystery man to fly off into the night sky howling
his name, TALLOW GLEEEEEE!!!! With that the kids return to their
bunks never to directly speak of this experience to anyone else, much
like most who suffer at the hands of a stranger. Oh and narrating old
Pete yammers on about how he found courage within himself or some
such foolishness.
For as much as I’ve
mocked this tape it made for a perfect early mood piece for the
season to come. No doubt this is a product of its time, that being
the early 1990s when every kid was into supernatural stuff be it
Goosebumps books or watching Unsolved Mysteries with
the fam. Likewise this was probably the last point in history where a
company could produce a tape that encouraged kids to seek out
entertainment from a strange drifter. On that front Campfire
Thrillers works as a bit of nostalgia whether you saw it back in
the day or are encountering it for the first time. What’s more
important is that the adventurous nature of such stories makes fine
inspiration for those of us planing our Halloween activities. More
than any other time of year this is when it’s best to cut loose and
look for something new and exciting. For legal purposes I’m not
advising you look into a strangers magic box just do something
reflective of that same ideal.
And with that our
Halloween coverage has officially begun. The original plan was to
wait a week or so longer but there's just something in the air this
year. The season refuses to be ignored with plentiful amounts of
novelties, foodstuffs, and entertainment already finding their ways
into the hands of the devoted. As always I'm excited to wave goodbye
to the doldrums of summer in order to embrace the best part of the
year. We're gonna have tons to talk about on our journey from this
night to that Griswold moment when we look up to the skies on October
31st. I hope you'll all gather round the fire and listen
to my whacky tales leading up to the big night.
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