‘Sleepaway Camp’ Negative Found! Scream Factory Announces a New 4K Restoration
Scream Factory has found the negative for Sleepaway Camp, and a new 4K restoration is coming. This is a big […]
Scream Factory has found the negative for Sleepaway Camp, and a new 4K restoration is coming. This is a big fucking deal for horror history.
The label shared the news on its official Instagram account, alongside a photograph of the film elements.
“We found the negative. 4K restoration coming soon.”
That’s a short announcement for something we should be talking about a whole lot more.
Sleepaway Camp might not get the same reverence as Halloween, Friday the 13th, or A Nightmare on Elm Street, but I consider it one of the most important slashers of all time. It also has one of the most shocking final scenes in cinema history. Even if you know what’s coming, that last image is something you don’t forget.
Written and directed by Robert Hiltzik, the 1983 film follows Angela, played by Felissa Rose (Terrifier 2), and her cousin Ricky, played by Jonathan Tiersten, to Camp Arawak, where bullying and summer-camp cruelty give way to a series of gruesome deaths. In his review of Scream Factory’s 2014 Blu-ray, Anthony Arrigo praised the film beyond its infamous finale, writing, “there’s a lot going on with writer/director Robert Hiltzik’s script to elevate it above its brethren.”
The movie has also inspired decades of discussion about Angela and the ending, something Rose explored in our interview about the film’s queer horror legacy. There’s a reason we’re still talking about it more than 40 years later.
For context, that earlier Blu-ray already advertised a 2K scan of the original camera negative. The news now is that Scream Factory has located the negative for a new 4K restoration.
Getting these films properly scanned and preserved matters. Sleepaway Camp deserves that care just as much as the bigger franchises that dominate the conversation.
Hopefully, we get a jam-packed release alongside the restoration. I’d love to be watching it next year, although the announcement only promises “coming soon.” Whatever the timing, I can’t wait to see what they’ve done with it.
