I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) – Review

The exact second Drew Barrymore picked up that ringing phone in Scream, the American slasher movie was reborn in a cavalcade of meta references, iconic costumes and some juicy box office which soon resulted in the splattery sub-genre’s second age. However, while it went in to produce a couple of genuine crackers (Scream 2, Halloween H20), it seemed that Hollywood forgot one fundamental problem that comes with costumed lunatics stalking teenagers with sharp implements; unless you do something starkly original (like Scream did), all these fucking movies end up being virtually indistinguishable from one another – much like it was in the 80s.
However, when he wasn’t fueling teem angst with James Van Der Beek’s eyebrows with Dawson’s Creek, writer Kevin Williamson managed to follow up his seminal Scream script with yet another, more traditional, stalk and slash. I Know What You Did Last Summer, sure, but after all this time, do we still care what they did thirty years ago?

It’s July 4th and four of the best and brightest of Southport, North Carolina are preparing to embark on their prosperous futures. Julie James, Ray Bronson, Helen Shivers and Barry Cox all celebrate after Helen wins a beauty pageant and the usual hard drinking and reckless driving ensue, but as they whizz along dark, costal roads, the inevitable happens as they plough into a mystery pedestrian with Barry’s car.
It’s here that we see the true colours of the teens finally come out as they squabble about what to do next as their victim lies lifeless at their feet. A drunk, paniking Barry immediately starts demanding that they not only flee the scene, but they actually dispose of the body too and Helen, who harbours dream of stardom and Ray, who genuinely seems to be quite dumb, all eventually agree while a horrified Julie is ultimately browbeaten into not contacting the authorities and the quartet find their evening shifting fully into crime. However, none of these novices in accidental murder have counted on the body not being all the way dead and after this unknown victim is turfed into the ocean they realise the full extent of their monumental fuck up.
Skip ahead a year and in the wake of their ordeal, the four friends have drifted apart, but after Julie returns home from college, she finds that an ominous letter awaits her. It only contains seven letters, but it’s ramifications could be devastating as the claim “I know what you did last summer” hints that someone witnessed the event that occured last 4th of July. Very slowly, the four former friends gravitate back to one another when they find out that they’ve all received threats and soon they’re all playing Nancy Drew to discover the identity of their stalker.
However, when an ominous figure dressed in a fisherman’s slicker and clasping a hook stars showing up, it becomes clear that this vendetta isn’t going to stop at some creative letter writing…

In many ways, I Know What You Did Last Summer was always to be destined to lurk in the shadow of its older brother Scream, which in many ways is like trying to compare Transformers to Go-Bots. With its fresh take on an exhausted genre delivered by Williamson and the measured scares delivered by veteran fear-meister, Wes Craven, the introduction of Ghostface became virtually iconic overnight as it threw in mobile phones, pop culture references and an impossibly hip cast who actually portrayed three dimensional characters. In comparison, Williamson’s script for I Know… played much more as it’s an adaption of a 1973 novel by Lois Duncan who was something of a pioneer of young-adult thrillers. As a result, where Scream got to the point right from the off, I Know… takes a more sedate pace, overtly dropping in more Dawson-esque angst between it’s characters rather than having them trade culture-savvy barbs and zippy one liners.
The result is rather an odd beast and it’s probably more telling of Hollywood’s attitude to trends that the majority of pretenders to Ghostface’s crown ended up being more akin to the slasher flicks Williamson and Craven were dissecting rather than a bold new version. However, that’s not to say that I Know… isn’t without it’s pleasures and even though it’s as jarring a reminder of the 90s that ever existed, there’s plenty of pulpy fun to be derived from it’s derivative nature.

For a start the cast, plundered from various teen-centric shows, are offensively pretty enough to make a fitting cluster of potential toe-tags as they fill out their textbook roles nicely. Ryan Phillipe is appropriately toxic enough to fulfill his rich bro role and Sarah Michelle Geller (faring far better in Buffy The Vampire Slayer than she does in both this and Scream 2) is appropriately toothy as the fame hungry Helen. But while Freddie Prince Jr. approaches the role of Ray with the deer-in-the-headlights look of a man who has only just learned English that morning, it’s Jennifer Love Hewitt and push-up bra deployed with military precision, that brings the pluck.
Also, while the killer’s rather eccentric design is no way as iconic as a black shroud and a Munch inspired mask, a black slicker and a hook do make a certain amount of sense considering the very atmospheric setting of a Carolina fishing village. In fact, the film’s unbroken streak of everything about being just not as good as Scream continues as the stalk and kill scenes simply lack that tangible snap that Wes Craven infused into that film.
However, that doesn’t mean that I Know What You Did Last Summer is a poorly constructed film, it’s just a rather basic one. The whole mystery aspect is kind of defused by there actually being no real suspects to choose from aside from random names of people who may or may not have died a year earlier and the body count is kind of minimal and restrained for those thirsting for the type of disembowellings usually seen in Woodsboro. However, there’s some good stuff here. A prolonged chase through a store and into an alley has a memorably cruel finish where the victim is callously brought down with salvation only mere feet away and the sight of a pre-Big Bang Theory Johnny Galecki catching a hook in the underside of the jaw is good value for money.

It may seem a tad unfair to keep comparing I Know What You Did Last Summer directly to Scream, especially considering that both movies are trying to attempt two very different tones; but considering that they were both were penned by the same man and one came out in the direct wake of the far more influential other, it’s virtually impossible not to. Memorable in its own right, but also thoroughly disposable, this is one neo-slasher that hooks you just enough to stick.
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