I Know What You Did Last Summer (18)
Directed by Jim Gillespie
Starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sarah Michelle Geller, Ryan Phillipe, Freddie Prinze Jr. Anne Hecht.
A surprise hit at the US box office, and the surprise really is why? After the success of Scream earlier this year, teen horror is back, but this film whil beginning well soon degenerated into an entirely predictable and disappointing slasher flick.
Opening with a beautiful helicopter shot of a beach and a twisty road, we soon meet the four central characters- stereotypes actually. Prom queen, Macho jock, sensitive studious girl, poor boy running with the rich kids. After a night out they are driving along said twisty road when they run over a man. Inexplicably they decide not to report it and decide to despose of the body into the sea, only when they dump it, the body isn't dead! After vowing never to speak of it again they split up. One year later, the sensitive one, Julie reluctantly returns from college to receive a note that says,"I know what you did last summer."
From this promising set up that has numerous possibilities, there follows a few annoying attacks before the killing starts. Once it does its just stalk and slash, and the finale when the killers identity is revealed is deeply disappointing. Having said that, there are a few good bits. The first killing takes place during a beauty pageant and is nicely handled, while another slaying just yards from a parade in amongst piles of tyres is a little stagey but quite good. Best of all is Anne Hecht as the creepy sister of the original victim, who is nicley ambiguous. The fishing town is quite pretty by the way.
The four young stars are entirely forgettable, poorly developed as characters. Also, the killers use of a hook is straight out of Candyman. Add to this the complete impossibility of most of the acts of surpise violence and the not so surprise shock ending and you have an extremely ordinary slasher film. Scream worked because of its self mockery and tongue in cheek attitude. This film takes itself very seriously, and Hecht apart, is entirely predictable. A shame as it had the makings of an intiguing film. 5/10.
Decmeber 1997
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