Strong and Moving!

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

One of my favourite childhood films, I am glad to say that it has held up very well. The film concerns a group of kids who, unbeknownst to their parents, create their own summer camp with the help of an eccentric former drama teacher. The premise could easily be the subject of a horror film but it is instead played for laughs! The script by Andrew Kurtzman and Elliot Wald is quite well written and, while it is not free of clichés, manages to avoid the most obvious stereotypes that plagued live action kids' films of the era and does not talk down to kids. However, I have to admit that I found it more fun than laugh out loud funny. In any event, the film is well directed by Jonathan Prince, who later created one of my favourite drama series, the criminally underrated "American Dreams".Without a shadow of a doubt, the perfectly cast Christopher Lloyd steals the show as the aforementioned drama teacher, an ex-hippie named Dennis Van Welker who once put on a musical production of "The Silence of the Lambs". As the kids have to fool their very gullible parents into thinking that they are going to different camps (computer, weight loss, military and theatrical), Lloyd's considerable skills as a comic actor are called upon when he has to imitate the various camp leaders. Lloyd gets most of the best lines and funniest scenes in the film. It is not just played for laughs, however, as he has a very sweet romance with Dr. Celeste Dunbar, played very well by Wendy Makkena, which reminded me somewhat of Doc's relationship with Clara in "Back to the Future Part III".Jonathan Jackson is very good as Morris "Mud" Himmel, the boy who came up with the idea of Camp Nowhere in the first place. He has a great screen presence and nice chemistry with Lloyd. Mud is supposed to be a geek but the script avoided making him an incredibly stereotypical one and this is a good decision as he is a more believable and relatable character as a result. Melody Kay is likewise good as his "girlfriend" Gaby Nowicki. However, she is supposed to be the relatable overweight girl but she is as thin as a rake. It's a shame that her only other film was the truly abysmal "The Neverending Story III" later the same year as she could have had a good career. Andrew Keegan and Marnette Patterson round out the younger cast as the troublemaker Zack Dell and the Valley Girl Trish Prescott, both of whom are revealed to be little more complicated than they first appear as the film progresses. Patterson is the weakest of the main four kid cast members but she is still quite good. She, Jackson and Keegan seemed to be in every live action kids' shows and film in the 1990s, incidentally. The younger cast also included future "Smallville" star Allison Mack and, making her film debut in a non-speaking role, Jessica Alba.The film also benefits from a strong adult supporting cast. In one of his final acting roles, the 87-year-old Burgess Meredith has a wonderful cameo as the owner of the campsite who recalls with great pleasure the sex and debauchery that the hippies got up to in the late 1960s. He has less than a minute's screen time but he is still the best thing about the film other than Lloyd, which says a lot. M. Emmet Walsh is suitably and reliably obnoxious as the debt collector T.R. Polk who is pursuing Dennis for missing 43 payments on his hideous yellow AMC Gremlin while Lloyd's "Back to the Future" co-star Thomas F. Wilson is very well cast as the dimwitted police officer Lt. Eliot Hendricks. I think that the two of them have almost as much interaction in this film as in all three "Back to the Future" films, actually. Kate Mulgrew is very funny in her small role as Trish's stage mother, as is Ray Baker as her clueless father. It also features nice small appearances from Peter Scolari, Peter Onorati, Jonathan Frakes and his wife (and Jackson's "General Hospital" co-star) Genie Francis.Overall, there is a very fun film which has some very clever moments which I did not appreciate when I was younger such as the extremely funny "Tennessee for Tots" production of "A Streetcar Named Desire" and aforementioned "The Silence of the Lambs" joke. Another little moment that I loved was one of the kids confusing "Star Trek IV" with "Rocky IV"! A sequel would have been nice but, alas, it was not to be.

Morris "Mud" Himmel doesn't want to go to summer computer camp. Gaby Nowicki (Melody Kay) is going to fat camp. Zack Dell (Andrew Keegan) is going to military camp. Trish Prescott (Marnette Patterson) is going to Broadway camp. The four disparate friends find former drama teacher Dennis Van Welker (Christopher Lloyd) hiding from debt collector T.R. Polk (M. Emmet Walsh). They hire him to trick their parents to go to a camp of their own making. Then other kids want in on the scam.This is a great kid escapist movie. I love the unlikely friendship of the four friends. They make this more than a simple childish fare. The only missing scene is a heart to heart with the four of them together. The movie splits up the group into the two coupling for the heart to heart. I want that Breakfast Club scene where the kids sit down and go into their lives. That would put this over the top. This is a fun movie for kids and younger teens.

Check out the review by KIDS FIRST! Film Critic Camille Bajema below: I like this film because it has a lot of super funny scenes and characters!This film is about four friends, Mud, Zack, Trish, and Gaby, played by Jonathan Jackson, Andrew Keegan, Marnette Patterson, and Melody Kay. These kids' parents want to send each of them to awful summer camps. They are all dreading it until Mud comes up with an idea to make up their own summer camp. They have the money to do it, but the only problem is that they have to have an adult to help them. Luckily, Mud has the "perfect" person in mind: Dennis Van Welker, played by Christopher Lloyd. Dennis has a shady past and is running from the law.Mud is a super smart boy who doesn't want to be sent of to computer camp; Zack is a delinquent who is about to be shipped off to military camp; Trish is a diva who absolutely doesn't want to go to theater camp; and Gaby is super smart and has a crush on Mud! She doesn't want to go to Camp Slenderella!Out of all these wonderful characters, my favorite one is Zack. I like Zack because although he has a frightening reputation, he's really funny and good at heart!My favorite scene in this film is when the parents come to visit their kids and the kids at Camp Nowhere and they have to pretend that the camp is whatever camp they're supposed to be at! Then the police get involved! I like this scene because it's so funny and exciting! The acting in this film is pretty good, although at some points it could have been better.This movie is written by Andrew Kurtzman and Eliot Wald and directed by Jonathan Price.The cinematography in this film is great! I especially love the setting -- a beautiful campus with an amazing lake and nice little camp cabins! It is very picturesque and I I can totally imagine myself there!I recommend this film to both boys and girls from age nine and up because it is a great film the family can watch together, although it is a bit long!I give this film five out of five stars because overall, I think it is very funny, clever and cute!

I thoroughly enjoyed Camp Nowhere! It's a great movie to just sit back and relax to, while vicariously living out on screen the things you wish you could have done as a teen. This movie is better than Meatballs, or other "summer camp" movies, as it doesn't feel the need to resort to sexual content to be funny.