Camp
“Camp”, also known as “Camp Value” or “Campyness” is a relatively wide spread slang term relating to the entertainment industry that a large number of people apparently don’t understand. While for members of other generations, this is almost to be expected, I have recently found a rash of my friends that don’t understand. For those of you out there that don’t know what Camp means, I’ll define it here, and then give some examples.
- Whatever makes suspension of disbelief difficult for you
- Things, such as acting or set design, being over-done to the point of kitsch
- The campy thing treats it’s self seriously
And now for a few examples to illustrate Camp.
Campy TV Shows
- Buffy the Vampire Slayers
- Power Rangers
- He-Man
- One Piece
- Thunder Cats
- Knight Rider
- Pokemon
- Xiaolin Showdown
- Star Trek (especially the original series)
Campy Movies
- Nearly every horror Movie on the planet
- Ace Ventura
- The Mask
- Power Rangers
- Pokemon
- Star Wars
- Star Trek
- Any movie with Robin Williams as a serious actor.
Things That Add Camp Value
- Afros
- Parachute Pants
- Peace/Zodiac Medallions
- Minions in jump suits
- Halting. Speech that. Sounds like… you don’t know what you’re going to say next!
As you can see from the list of things above, camp exists in real life, as well as in the media, and things that are currently viewed as campy were likely viewed as reasonable and normal in their own age.
There is some debate as to whether parodying something campy qualifies as being campy, or just a parody. Movies in this category include the Scary Movie series and it’s derivatives, and Austin Powers. Yes, it’s a parody of how British spies from that era actually acted… and spy movies in general.
September 15th, 2007 at 6:11 pm
I have a very simple criteria for deciding if something is good or not. It’s called “Do I like this?” Terminology is irrelevant. Especially a quality that spans from the horrible to the awesome.