Children of the Eternal Summer

Married couple Dan and Claudia Bishop are traveling through the Californian desert for vacations. They have been having problems in their marriage after Claudia, an actress, was required to have sex scenes in her latest movie, which made Dan jealous and caused him to make out with a friend of hers while he was drunk. They are trying to reconnect as a couple. While both of them make their effort to solve their problem, the constant reminder of it causes them to argue constantly, and to even consider getting a divorce. While Dan tries to convince Claudia that they are just in a rough patch, Claudia believes that this is the end of the line for them. As they argue, their tires are bust as they drive over some broken bottles that someone left in the middle of the road. The couple is stranded for a few hours, with little to no phone signal to ask for help, until a red jeep driven by two girls appears. The girls, Mac and Marjorie, saw Dan and Claudia back in the diner where they had breakfast and quickly recognize them. Marjorie is a little hesitant about it, but Mac finally convinces her to give Dan and Claudia a ride to their place, so they can call for help. While driving, the two groups talk and get to know each other. Mac and Marjorie are revealed to be a couple, and they recognize Claudia from an old orange soda that made her famous years ago, which causes them to get along. Mac also gets to like Dan, as he tries to show support for Claudia's work. However, things slowly begin to get tense as Mac and Marjorie share some extremist points of view and by the time Dan and Claudia are revealed to be taken to a recreational camp in the middle of the desert, the couple starts to worry. Mac and Marjorie drive them to their place, a hippie-like camp known as The Children of the Eternal Summer, where Dan and Claudia are introduced to its leader, Gilroy Sloane. Known as The Son of the Desert, Gilroy is a charismatic man who has decided to create his isolated community as he considers that modern society is heading to a complete disaster due to its obsession to consume. Gilroy is convinced that the Children are humanity's last hope and invites Dan and Claudia to spend the night at the camp so they can know more about them, and maybe even join them. Dan and Claudia politely decline, insisting that they must leave as soon as possible. Gilroy agrees to take Dan with their mechanic, Brian, while asking Mac and Marjorie to give Claudia a tour around the camp. Mac and Marjorie take Claudia for a drink. While fooling around after dancing, they question Claudia on what it is like to be an actress. As Claudia explains to them the problems she has had with Dan because of her work, Marjorie begins to speak against Dan. Mac tries to defend him, but Marjorie insists on her idea that all men are evil and cannot be trusted, and explains to Claudia that Mac was abused by her own cousins and forced to leave home after getting pregnant. Claudia tries to explain that Dan isn't like that, and attempts to leave as things get uncomfortable, but as soon as she gets up she falls intoxicated. As it turns out, something was put on her drink. Meanwhile, as Dan is taken to the mechanic, he is hit in the head, which leaves him unconscious. Dan wakes up finding himself in the middle of a ritual alongside two other persons. The ritual is conducted by Gilroy, who calls it a rebirth for three new Daughters, among which is a hypnotized Claudia and it consists in having the three Daughters kill a member of their family and eat their heart. For Gilroy, this is the way his Children will end up with the consumer parasites of the world and create a brand-new society. As the first two persons are killed, Gilroy and the Children are in full ecstasy, but Mac begins to doubt, believing that Dan doesn't deserve to get killed by Claudia and ends up interrupting Claudia's initiation, asking Gilroy to let Dan live. Gilroy refuses, saying that the only way Claudia can join them is by killing her husband and explaining that is either that or killing both Dan and Claudia as they can't leave. As Mac continues to defend Dan, she sets him free and chaos breaks loose. Marjorie tries to stop Mac to protect her, and Dan ends up getting a knife with which he defends himself and Claudia. Fearing that his Children might get hurt, Gilroy accepts in letting Dan and Claudia leave. Dan escapes together with the hypnotized Claudia, and while the Children try to turn off the fire started by the fight between Dan, Mac, and Marjorie, Gilroy reunites with Mac and Marjorie. Gilroy scolds them for jeopardizing the ceremony and the entire camp and asks Marjorie to find them or else, neither she nor Mac will be welcomed there. She hurries her to do this before something else happens. Marjorie kisses Mac and promises her to be back on time, then leaves. Dan finds the belongings of the other victims of the ritual and gets a car for himself and Claudia, who, after losing consciousness, wakes up, confused, and with no memory of the ceremony. Dan tells her all about it while trying to drive away. However, they don't get too far as the tires are burst by a chain with nails (which makes them understand that the broken bottles that caused them to get stranded were a trap from the Children all along). With no other option, they decide to walk through the desert, hoping to find someone to help them. While walking, a tearful Claudia apologizes to Dan for having tried to kill him (as well as everything else), to which Dan replies that she has nothing to apologize for, and apologizes to her as well. As the couple makes peace, they find the same diner in which they stopped in the morning and ask for help. They are received by a waitress, a cook, and a gas station attendant. After calling the police, they are offered food by the waitress and Claudia recognizes her arm as the same arm that gave her the drink with the drug in the camp. Terrified, she asks Dan not to eat what she is offering and as their true identities are revealed, Dan and Claudia are trapped by the three characters, who also reveal that the call to the police was actually a call to the camp. As they wonder what the camp will do with them, Dan makes an effort to escape and fights the gas station attendant and the cook, even though he ends up getting shot. Amidst the chaos, Claudia fights the waitress and kills her by stabbing her head with a knife. Claudia uses the cook's shotgun to kill him and the gas station attendant, and tries to help Dan to get up when Marjorie arrives. Dan tries to fight her, but Marjorie shoots at his abdomen, and forces Claudia to surrender. Unable to do otherwise, Dan and Claudia let themselves be taken by Marjorie back to the camp. As they arrive, Dan dies in Claudia's arms, while a desperate Marjorie searches for Gilroy. Marjorie turns Claudia to him, and Gilroy forgives her. Marjorie asks for Mac and Gilroy reveals to her that, since Marjorie was unable to find Dan and Claudia before they killed the people in the diner, they had no choice but to kill Mac as a punishment for her actions. As Gilroy tells Marjorie that she can keep Mac's skull, a shocked Marjorie breaks down and ends up shooting Gilroy. She kills him and Brian, and as she is about to kill Claudia, calling her the reason for all of this, she is shot by Gilroy's people. Claudia takes advantage of the chaos to release herself and kill Marjorie. However, as Claudia is about to escape, she sees Dan's body and decides that she can't leave things like that. A raged Claudia runs over one of the guards, steals his gun, and comes back to the camp, pouring gasoline all over it. She fights and executes as many Children of the Eternal Summer as she can, first with the rifle, then with a chainsaw she finds in their greenhouse, and even though she ends up getting badly wounded in the process, Claudia succeeds in destroying the camp. She burns it to the ground and leaves together with Dan's body, telling him that he was right and that they would be together to the end. Claudia's jeep drives away to an uncertain destiny as the Children of the Eternal Summer are consumed by the fire. What becomes of her is unclear.