IN HER famous essay "Notes on 'Camp,' " Susan Sontag lists films she considered to be aligned with the schlocky sensibility she described as a "love of the unnatural: of artifice and exaggeration."
Ernest Schoedsack's 1933 "King Kong" and "The Maltese Falcon" were on the writer's list. And though "Sylvia," a tale of a prostitute trying to go good, was released a year after "Notes on 'Camp' " was published in 1964, it surely would have filled Sontag's bill.
Gordon Douglas' "Sylvia," starring "Baby Doll" Carroll Baker, was undermined by poor choices. "Everything about this movie goes against its supposed serious theme," says filmmaker George Kuchar from his home in San Francisco. "They were trying to make Baker a big star, but when it's obvious that she's on her knees so that she's shorter than the leading man, that's when the movie gets ridiculous."
Kuchar is no stranger to campy stunts himself. In his own underground 1962 film "Night of the Bomb," made with his twin brother Mike, Kuchar stood in for his leading lady in a nude scene. "It was all shot from the back," he says, "but the audience senses that she's kind of too big-boned."
The director's own experience makes him a prime fit as curator of Cinefamily's Summer "Camp," one of two series that are sure to delight audiences with camp as fetid as a Valley dump in late July.
In addition to "Sylvia," Summer "Camp" features "Queen of Outer Space" with camp high priestess Zsa Zsa Gabor; "Konga," a sci-fi adventure about a teenage gorilla; and other effervescent classics.
And this weekend, American Cinematheque will celebrate another camp staple, the mai tai-soaked decorative style known as Tiki, with Enchanted Tiki Luau Blow-Out, featuring screenings and a dinner.
In its fourth year, the American Cinematheque celebration includes screenings of "Fair Wind to Java," "Aloma of the South Seas" and local artist Kevin Kidney's "Tiki on TV," a collection of rare clips from shows such as "Adventures in Paradise," written by James Michener.
"I think Michener was trying to break into TV," Kidney, a former designer for Disney, says. "It's about a guy who has a charter boat and he picks up different passengers. . . . Sometimes he rescues someone or he falls in love, but only for one episode."
