Rhys (one name only, y’know, like Cher) has put out this execrable single, Hot Summer. Cringeworthy rhyme-schemes, a chorus that has little more than two notes and two words. (Hot summer… Hot summer… hot hot summer… ) I think the dancing is supposed to look serious. It’s a cover of a song done by German group Monrose of the same name, which may be even worse (certainly the clip is cheap and nasty, and notice how little the girls dance):

I only express such animosity to Rhys’ song because, loathe though I am to admit it, it sticks in my head. But I can’t decide, is the whole concoction, music, lyrics, etc. a good example of naive, pure Camp, or is it simply bad? As Sontag put it in her near-perfect essay “Notes on Camp“:

23. In naïve, or pure, Camp, the essential element is seriousness, a seriousness that fails. Of course, not all seriousness that fails can be redeemed as Camp. Only that which has the proper mixture of the exaggerated, the fantastic, the passionate, and the naïve.

24. When something is just bad (rather than Camp), it’s often because it is too mediocre in its ambition. The artist hasn’t attempted to do anything really outlandish. (“It’s too much,” “It’s too fantastic,” “It’s not to be believed,” are standard phrases of Camp enthusiasm.)

What do you think?

I like how Allen’s films are almost deliberately “rough”. The script isn’t primped to within an inch of its life, sometimes the lines sound incredibly real, but at other times, the characters seem much more to be actors, saying slightly stilted lines and playing out a story. The narratorial intrusions also keep it story-like. It gives the film an honest and direct character, paring back tricksiness to at once expose the communication but also improve it.