Starring: Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prinze Jr., Ryan Phillippe, Bridgette Wilson-Sampras, Anne Heche, Johnny Galecki.
Director: Jim Gillespie.
Hoo, boy, am I in for it or what? I think I re-watched this a couple years ago and found it unbelievably silly. The cast is pure mid-nineties, which is kinda cool, This was, of course, immediately following Scream and the Kevin Williamson self-aware, TV star led, mainstream horror craze that really hasn't slowed down much. It's not necessarily a bad thing-more horror movies are a source of goodness, after all-but it did kind of diminish quality a bit.
I think the title choice of this franchise is such an excellent marketing idea. It opens itself for so many more sequels. I think we should make I Occasionally Know What You Did Last Summer, I Think I Know What You Did Last Summer, and the Prequel I Know What You Did That One Summer Awhile Back. After that, we can do the remake I Vaguely Know What You Did Last Summer.
But, okay, let's do this.
Opening on a Type-O Negative cover of "Summer Breeze" is...well, hey, that's actually kinda rad, isn't it? Maybe this won't be as bad as I remember it.
The guy who sits on the cliff looking depressed with the locket? That's exactly what I look like when I remember that I own all of the Last Summer series.
I remember watching some Party Of Five when I was a young teenager and falling totally in love with Jennifer Love Hewitt. Seeing her young, fresh faced, charismatic and beautiful in this film it's not hard for me to figure out why. She might have one of the sweetest smiles I've ever seen.
These characters are all very simple. And mostly obnoxious. Phillippe does well with being a douche bag, Prinze is as vacant eyed and dopey as ever...Gellar and Hewitt are doing alright, though, despite their cliched roles. Hewitt is a classic 'final girl':conservative dress (not complaining-I love long skirts), obviously intelligent (as her clearly intimidated boyfriend notes...charming lad) and oddly critical on alternative lifestyle Women. Gellar seems conflicted: the movie can't seem to decide if they want her to be deceptively intelligent or vapid. On one hand she seems to know what she's about, but on the other her run down of her future life is pretty shallow and insipid. At the very least, she could have chosen a better soap to be on than Guiding Light.
Was this dialogue ever considered fresh? The conversation about the various ways the Hook-Handed killer story is told is remarkably forced and heavy-handed. It's also highly contrived: they're attacked by a hook-handed killer entirely by coincidence. Williamson had a hard-on for characters skimming the surface of fictional deconstruction in dialogue, I get that and don't even necessarily hate the principle (I often speak in fictional deconstruction, after all, mostly because I love the sound of my own voice), but...it just comes across as so shallow and gimmicky.
Wait...how did the corpse get that far in front of the car? Shouldn't it have been behind the vehicle? I don't remember how this ends, though. Doesn't that end up not being the guy they hit or something? Then something to do with Anne Heche or whatever?
Oh, all the arguments these kids make are ridiculous. That's the point, of course, but right after Julie makes the point that none of them are Doctors and, as such, are not qualified to make the call if the guy is dead or not (the only intelligent thing said whatsoever), they then basically pretend they're lawyers and/or cops. Not all of it is entirely wrong, but I don't think it would nearly be as extreme as they're claiming.
This is how I prefer to remember Johnny Galecki. Well, more like Suicide Kings. But I hate The Big Bang Theory.
Oh, Phillippe. How much coke did you do before making these performances choices? Every line is absolutely ROARED.
Julies parents chose the ugliest paint for their house. No wonder she was so reluctant to come home over the course of the year. Not the, y'know, accomplice to murder thing. Shitty house paint.
I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about Lois Duncan. Remember Lois Duncan kids? Well, not kids, you guys probably won't remember her at all. See, in the Nineties, there were these things called Books and we read them. Some of those books were written by people named Lois Duncan, R.L. Stein, Christopher Pike (who was my favorite) and John Saul. Those were the good old days: Young Adult Horror Novels were awesome way back then. I kind of want to read some of them again, actually. I'd say that Lois is probably pretty embarrassed that this film series is her legacy...but she probably dug cashing the paychecks. Good for her.
There is one solid positive going on here, actually: Hewitt basically completely transformed herself for the role. It looks like she lost a ton of weight, hasn't slept in a year...quite a change from the beginning of the film, actually. I'm just going to say it: Jennifer Love Hewitt is actually good in this.
Again, such silly, self-obsessed dialogue: it's been one year and they're all acting like "My whole life is over." Good god, really? They're nineteen! Gellar is working at a department store and acts like her whole life is failure. Does any nineteen year old just magically get everything done?
Pretty sure that car attack really should have killed Barry. That's a really bad accident. Instead he gets the opportunity to bellow out more dialogue. Seriously, does this guy do anything but yell? Does he, y'know, like candy or something? Puppies? Somehow I feel like someone would offer him a candy bar and he'd say "HOLY FUCK YOU ASSHOLE, I FUCKING LOOOOOOVE CANDY BARS" and then punch a wall out of pure excitement.
I really do have a love affair with Sarah Michelle Gellar circa 1996-97. What a beautiful Woman.
These kids are not sympathetic enough for me to really fear for them. Again and again the fill presents this "Our lives are ruined" thing. Maybe if it was I Know What You Did Ten Years Ago I might be able to feel some sort of sympathy...plus, y'know, they killed a guy and lied about it. I feel some sympathy for Gellar because her sister is bafflingly horrible to her (though I don't quite understand why Elsa lives at home if she manages a department store)...but I can't help but laugh at her reaction to losing some hair. Shrieking and smashing a mirror? Brilliant. I mean, sure, it does mean the guy was in her bedroom but...still. I do like that our killer basically attacks through teenage pranks.
How has Barry not been arrested? Assaulting Max, tackling an old dude in public...seriously, what does it take to get arrested in this town? I have a feeling if they'd called the police after running the guy over the Police would probably just say "Eh, whadda ya gonna do?"
Pretty horrible torture: making the previous years Pageant Queen sit on stage and watch the new contestants do their acts. I mean, seriously. That's pretty cruel.
Yep, that basically proves it: the Cop basically shrugs when she says that someone killed Barry. They would have told the cops what they did and the cops would have basically giggled and said "Yeah, riiiiight, you ran a guy over, I getcha" and shrugged it all off. I'm glad that cop got killed. It's too bad the killer doesn't do quips: would have been cool for him to start doing N.W.A lyrics or something.
I don't think it's just the cops: apparently nobody believes that any crime whatsoever is possible in this town. Elsa responds to "I was attacked" with incredulous irritation. I'm surprised she didn't respond to the Killer advancing on her with sarcastic derision.
Gellar can scream really well. It's still odd to see her running and screaming instead of kicking ass. It's not a bad slasher chase scene, though. The death itself is a little convoluted: she stops just short of getting into the public? He teleports behind her? Even with all the noise (and why is the parade happening at the same time as the fireworks?) nobody hears?
Julie is the opposite of everyone in town: she jumps to the conclusion of mortal danger far too quickly. It takes the slightest bit of circumstantial evidence for her to just completely turn on Ray and accuse him of being the killer. Of course, then the actual killer (AKA some guy) does come after...can she not swim? They're, like, thirty feet away from the dock, and she lives in a fishing village. Luckily for her Ray just assumed there was danger, too. Considering all he knew was that somebody knew they had hit somebody and not, y'know, that two of his friends were dead or that the guy who had knocked him out was the one attacking people.
Jesus, Julie, why did you shout Rays name in the middle of a fight? Acknowledge him after he's done fighting the maniac.
Wow, death by Rube Goldberg. That was almost impressive in the sheer scale of absurdity.
"I understand your pain." WAT. Prinze...buddy...acting lessons.
Julie is now back to being hot and healthy looking again...she's in the locker room and her room mate delivers her to mail TO the locker room? Why wouldn't she leave it in the dorm room?
Final Thoughts: Well, this could be a lot worse, really. Hewitt is good in it but her character is rather underdeveloped. Actually, we learn a lot more about Gellar despite her being less sympathetic in the long run. Their male co-stars are terrible. Seriously. Especially Prinze. The story is very convoluted and poorly scripted, most of the death scenes are too quick to be considered anything noteworthy...but we do have the nice chase scene involving Gellar.
Final Rating: Two Stars.
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