I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER (1997 - HORROR / MYSTERY / SLASHER) ***1/2 out of ***** OR 7 out of 10
(Well, it's better than knowing who you did last summer. Just saying...)
CAST: Jennifer Love Hewitt, Freddie Prinze Jr., Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Philippe, Muse Watson, Bridgette Wilson, Johnny Galecki, Anne Heche, Jonathan Quint, Stuart Greer, Deborah Hobart.
DIRECTOR: Jim Gillespie
(WARNING: Some SPOILERS and many reasons to not own a car - straight
ahead...)
IT'S LIKE THIS: If horror movie villains would just learn to be more forgiving, the horror genre would probably cease to exist. Imagine if the killers/ghosts from FRIDAY THE 13TH, PROM NIGHT, TERROR TRAIN, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, THE HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW, PUMPKINHEAD, APRIL FOOL'S DAY, SCREAM, VALENTINE, URBAN LEGEND, GRADUATION DAY, WHAT LIES BENEATH, THE CHANGELING, THE FOG, THE ORPHANAGE, and many, many, many other fright flicks would just learn to let go and say "past is past" and "vengeance will not solve anything" and "no use slashing over spilled milk" and simply take up buddhism, then their combined body count would have been zilch. Or even less.
If horror movie villains were more gracious and forgiving, the four central dunderheads of our next "31 DAYS OF HALLOWEEN" review wouldn't be in the pickle they're in now. To make characterization easy, I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER reaches into the "Horror Movie Grab Bag of Stereotypes" and gives us "Good Girl" Julie James (Jennifer Love Hewitt), "Sensitive Good Guy" Ray Bronson (Freddie Prinze Jr.), "Whorish Party Girl" Helen Shivers (Sarah Michelle Gellar), and "Colossal Douche" Barry Cox (Ryan Philippe). It seems that our four horror movie cliches are basically being stalked by a hooded, rainslicker-wearing, hook-wielding killer - exactly one year after the summer of their high school graduation.
Why, you may rightly ask? Well, let's just say that, giddy with delight at finally being out of high school and poised to conquer the world, our pre-collegiate quartet accidentally run over someone on a country road outside their small North Carolina fishing village after a Fourth of July party. Aaaaaand there goes their buzz. Freaking out, Barry The Douche tells the others that they should toss the dead man's body into the sea and forget anything ever happened - or else their futures are fucked. Ray The Sensitive Guy actually turns out to be somewhat of a douche, as well, because he automatically agrees. So does Helen The Whore. Julie the Goodie Goodie balks at this though. However, faced with the possibility of a right hook from Barry The Douche, she caves in and agrees. Hmmmm... given that Ray The Sensitive Guy didn't do a damn thing to protect his gal, maybe we should call him the douche?
Whatever. Anyhow, like I said, fast forward to one year later and Julie has come home for the summer. Seems her first year at college was pretty much a bust. Her grades are down and her mother (Deborah Hobart) is convinced that she's on drugs. Little does she know that what ails her daughter isn't chemical-based, but guilt-driven. You see, Julie still feels awful about having participated in the hit-and-run cover up last summer - and is pretty miserable. Well, Julie dear... are bad as things are they're about to get 100% worse. Say, Is that the mailman I hear? Have you checked the mail yet? Think there might be something for you, Julie? Hmmmmmmmmmm....
Turns out a letter has arrived, indeed addressed to Julie, with one sentence that basically makes her wet her panties with horror: CONGRATULATIONS, YOU HAVE BEEN CHOSEN FROM A NATIONWIDE RAFFLE TO BE TAYLOR SWIFT AND JUSTIN BIEBER'S BFF FOR A DAY. Kidding. Taylor Swift was still in her diapers and Justin Bieber was probably still in his father's nutsac and the term "BFF" hadn't bee invented yet when this movie was made. Nope, folks, the mysterious letter Julie gets actually reads... I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, BITCH!"
Okay, it doesn't say "bitch" but the rest of it is accurate.
Panicking, Julie visits the Shivers Department Store which, in this podunk North Carolina fishing village, is apparently the equivalent of Macy's and Nordstrom combined - and is owned by Helen The Whore's family. Julie questions Elsa (Bridgette Wilson), Helen's sister, and asks her if she has Helen's number in New York. Apparently, Helen The Whore had big dreams of moving to New York after high school to become a model. Despite looking to be all of five feet-three inches (tops) with some serious platform shoes on. Someone should've told her that real models have legs that are longer than she is tall.
No worries, though, because it turned out that Helen actually moved back to Podunk, NC, and is now working with Elsa in the department store. Guess Helen The Whore learned about a little something called a "minimum height requirement". Which, from what I understand, is around 5'9". Which makes Helen about, oh, three feet off. Anyhow, Julie cuts to the chase and tells Helen about the note. Needless to say, this isn't exactly what Helen was hoping to hear from her long-lost friend.
Julie and Helen eventually track down Barry who, like Julie, is home for the summer from college. And it appears that the passing of an entire year hasn't made him even one iota less of an asshole. Turns out that he and Helen broke up after the accident. So did Julie and Ray who, it turns out, is also still in town and now works as a fisherman. Unfortunately, our four horror movie stereotypes don't really have much time to catch up with one another, given that someone appears to know all about the hit-and-run from a year ago.
Barry, ever the patronizing prick, tells Julie that the letter means nothing. As if these morons did anything else particularly notable last summer that would warrant someone writing them about it. It's my great delight to report, then, that Barry becomes a victim of a hit-and-run himself outside his gym one night - with his own car, driven by a shadowy, hooded figure in a rainslicker, waving a mean hook. By the way, if you need further proof that Barry is The Grand High Priest Of Douchebaggery, I should point out that he drives a BMW in a fishing village. That's kind of like wearing a Giorgio Armani suit in the middle of a slum.
Sadly, our killer seems to be a very inefficient one and lets Barry live. Same thing with Helen, whose prized, pampered hair our killer chops up while she is sleeping - causing her to overact like a champ when she wakes up the next morning and sees his not-so-professional handiwork. Actually, this forces her to get a sleek long bob that, quite honestly, makes her look more classy, and less whorey. She should actually thank him.
Then the first murder happens... then the next one.... and then the next. Uh-fucking-oh, folks....
Who is the hooded, hook-swinging killer in the rainslicker? What is his master plan? And why didn't he kill Barry and Helen when he had a chance? Is he just playing with them? Like a cat taunting a mouse? Or is he just prolonging their suffering? Is the guy that they ran over, David Egan (Jonathan Quint), back from beyond the grave to avenge his death? Or is it Elsa, who's always been jealous of Helen? Or is it Max (Johnny Galecki), who has always wanted to hang out with our four stereotypes but kept getting rebuffed? Did he see something that night one year ago? Or is it Melissa (Anne Heche), the lonely sister of David? Or, omigod, is it the Gorton's Fisherman?
I hope so. Maybe he can pass out some fish sticks before he kills these twits.
BUT SERIOUSLY: Following the surprise success of SCREAM in 1996 that revived the Slasher Sub-Genre (and, ultimately, the entire Horror Genre), a lot of eyes were on I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER. Primarily because it was the first post-modern slasher to be released in the wake of SCREAM's trailblaze the year prior - and industry pundits were wondering how it would do. If it was also a hit, it would prove that SCREAM was not a fluke. I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER was also written/adapted by the same screenwriter (from the 1973 book by Lois Duncan) who penned SCREAM: Kevin Williamson. Naturally, many were people were hoping for lightning to strike twice.
Long story short, it did. While I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER wasn't as big a hit as SCREAM, it was still a very solid success - grossing a an impressive $72 million in North America alone ($125 million, worldwide). Then SCREAM 2 opened later in 1997 and repeated SCREAM's business ($172 million, worldwide). There was no denying it: the Slasher Sub-Genre was alive and well again. Soon, we were seeing the likes of URBAN LEGEND, CHERRY FALLS, and VALENTINE, not to mention more sequels like SCREAM 3, I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, and URBAN LEGENDS: FINAL CUT.
By the time VALENTINE was released in 2001, five years after SCREAM's release, the Slasher Sub-Genre was starting to sputter again, very much the same way it did in the early 80's when too many sub-standard entries followed the successful wakes of HALLOWEEN, FRIDAY THE 13TH, and PROM NIGHT. In 1997, though, the Post-Modern Slasher Sub-Genre started by SCREAM was still fresh. And I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER capitalized on it, taking SCREAM's tropes but playing them more serious and straight-faced.
Some have criticized this movie for essentially being the kind of slasher movie that SCREAM lampooned, but at least it is a solidly-good slasher movie. Besides, SCREAM's self-aware, meta outlook was organic to that film and doesn't belong here. Instead, Kevin Williamson and director Jim Gillespie just concentrate on telling as good and as suspenseful a story as they can, without repeating SCREAM's knowing attitude. That's not to say that there aren't any self-aware moments in I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER. You can just count them on one hand. And for this movie, that's just the right amount. What worked for SCREAM, may not necessarily work here.
Even though they are essentially playing Slasher Movie Stereotypes, the young cast at least tries to give some nuances and shadings to their roles, some of them more successfully than others. This is largely, of course, due to the script by Williamson which does a nice job of showing how the guilt from the hit-and-run has greatly affected the once-promising lives of these four kids. Of the four, Jennifer Love Hewitt fares best as Julie James; she takes the "Good Girl" horror movie cliche and makes it truly sympathetic and layered. Sarah Michelle Gellar also does the same thing for Helen, who is gradually revealed to be a bit more complex than we thought. Unfortunately, Freddy Prinze Jr. and Ryan Philippe are a bit one-note as Ray and Barry, but they are competent and never hinder the proceedings. Largely because Hewitt and Gellar do the heavy lifting for them.
I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER also has one of the best chase scenes in the Horror Genre. Clearly modeled after the one in PROM NIGHT (1980), wherein Wendy (Eddie Benton) is chased through the darkened high school while decked out her in her prom dress, this sequence is easily the film's high point, with Helen being terrorized by the killer after having just left the Fourth of July celebration. Gillespie toys masterfully with audience expectations during this setpiece, giving it an almost excruciatingly suspenseful quality as the killer plays a relentless game of cat and mouse with Helen until he... well, you should see it for yourself. Suffice it to say, many horror fans point to this chase scene (and the one from PROM NIGHT) as the among the very best in the Horror Genre.
Ultimately, I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER is a worthy entry into the Post-Modern Slasher Sub-Genre. It may not be as "special" as SCREAM, but then again it never was meant to be. It just aims to be a good, straightforward throwback to the classic slasher flicks of old that set out to scare the crap out of us - and like them, it largely succeeds.
