I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) - The teen slasher favorite

♥♥♥♥

 

Pouty-faced teen stars in eerie lighting make up this effective poster for Jim Gillespie's I Know What You Did Last Summer

Two beautiful, promising young high school grad couples are heading to college when on one late, fateful night, they make a terrible mistake, which they pay dearly for the following year ...

 

I Know What You Did Last Summer is written by Kevin Williamson (Scream (1996)), loosely based on the same-titled 1973 novel by Lois Duncan (Killing Mr. Griffin (1978)), and directed by debuting Jim Gillespie (Venom (2005)).

Subtlety is not a virtue that this teen slasher pursues, but it works very well as top-tuned youth horror with four excellent stars, - especially Sarah Michelle Gellar's (Cruel Intentions (1999)) screams are epic, - and a simple premise of transgression and punishment, which is classical for the horror genre and very well made.

I Know What You Did Last Summer is a deeply entertaining minor 1990s classic that merits revisits. 

 

Related post:

 

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998) - Cannon slashes possible franchise with repititious turkey 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 17 mil. $

Box office: 125.5 mil. $

= Huge hit (returned 7.38 times its cost)

[I Know What You Did Last Summer premiered 9 October (Austin Film Festival) and runs 101 minutes. Williamson had written the script prior to Scream, and with that film's immense success, Columbia Pictures hurried to put I Know What You Did Last Summer into production. Ryan Phillippe (The Way of the Gun (2000)) was paid 250k $ for his performance in the film. Shooting took place from March - June 1997 in North Carolina and California. The film opened #1 to a 15.8 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent another 2 weekends at #1 and then one more in the top 5 (#3), grossing 72.5 mil. $ (57.8 % of the total gross). Roger Ebert gave it a 1/4 star review, translating to 3 notches under this one. Gillespie returned with D-Tox (2002). Jennifer Love-Hewitt (House Arrest (1996)) first returned in Boy Meets World (1998, TV-series) before her theatrical return in Can't Hardly Wait (1998); Gellar in Scream 2 (1997); Phillippe in Homegrown (1998) and Freddie Prinze Jr. (Scooby-Doo (2002)) in Sparkler (1997). Hewitt and Prinze Jr. returned in the sequel I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998), and a second sequel is slated for the summer of 2025. I Know What You Did Last Summer is rotten at 47 % with a 5.40/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of I Know What You Did Last Summer?

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (1998) - Cannon slashes possible franchise with repititious turkey

♥

 

Four sexy young actors in scarlet-colored light about to be ripped apart on this effective poster for Danny Cannon's I Still Know What You Did Last Summer

Julie and her boyfriend are in college, and they haven't done more wrong (since the preceding summer's fatal hit-and-run car accident on a skid road), and yet as they head to the Bahamas for vacation, a cloak-wearing maniac tracks them, spreading terror and death.

 

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer is written by Trey Callaway (Phobia (2001, TV movie)) and directed by Danny Cannon (Strangers (1991)). It is a sequel to I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997).

The plot is pointless, and the film meticulously copies elements from the successful predecessor, even including having lead Jennifer Love Hewitt (Time of Your Life (1999-00)) do hysterical pirouettes in public while screaming to the killer.

Jack Black (The School of Rock (2003)) is a funny dope-dealer who is (predictably) killed. I Still Know What You Did Last Summer is deadly boring and about as intelligent as an ironing board.

Related post:

1998 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

 

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: Reportedly 24 mil. $

Box office: 84 mil. $

= Big hit (returned 3.5 times its cost)

[I Still Know What You Did Last Summer was released 13 November (USA) and runs 101 minutes. Shooting took place from April - July 1998 in California, including Los Angeles) and in Mexico. The film opened #2, behind holdover hit The Waterboy, to a 16.5 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent one more weekend in the top 5 (#5) and grossed 40 mil. $ (47.6 % of the total gross). The film in some sites has a listed budget of 65 mil. $, which must be wrong, (the original film from the year before had a 17 mil. $ cost.) 65 mil. $ may likely be the cost including prints and advertising, expenditures that are normally not included in the budget. Roger Ebert gave the film a 1/4 star review, translating to a notch under this one. Cannon returned with Björk: Volumen (1999, music video) and CSI: Miami (2003-04) prior to his theatrical return with Goal: The Dream Begins (2005). Hewitt returned in Hercules (1999, TV-series) and theatrically in The Suburbans (1999); Freddie Prinze Jr. (Brooklyn Rules (2007)) in Vig (1998, TV movie) and theatrically in She's All That (1999). I Still Know What You Did Last Summer is rotten at 7 % with a 3.40/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of I Still Know What You Did Last Summer?

Garfield/Garfield: The Movie (2004) - Davies' comical cat in dull movie debut

♥♥

 

An amusing poster for the movie adaptation of the famous comics feline, Peter Hewitt's Garfield

Lazy house cat Garfield's owner John acquires a dog to make an impression on a girl, but when said dog gets stolen by an amoral TV host, Garfield gets overlooked, and so he decides to get the woof-meister back!

Garfield is written by Joel Cohen and Alec Sokolow (Toy Story (1995), both), based on the long-running same-titled 1978-? comics by Jim Davies (U.S. Acres (1986-89)), and directed by Peter Hewitt (Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991)).

Both script and direction are uninspired, and Breckin Meyer (King of the Hill (2000-10)) and a stiff-as-an-ironing-board Jennifer Love Hewitt (Heartbreakers (2001)) are inauthentic and bereft of charm as the film's main human stars. Bill Murray (Coming Attractions (1978)) voicing the title character is the film's biggest draw.

Garfield is a far-fetched and by-the-numbers exploitative attempt at cashing in on Davies' beloved creation. It will entertain children without giving them anything real in return for their time and attention. It is a fairly vapid flick.

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 50 mil. $

Box office: 203.1 mil. $

= Big hit (returned 4.06 times its cost)

[Garfield premiered 6 June (Los Angeles) and runs 85 minutes. Murray has explained his performance in the film as given due to his mistakenly thought that (master filmmaker) Joel Coen had co-written the script, not Cohen, - but the anecdote is described by Sokolow as "complete horse shit." Shooting took place from March - June 2003 in the UK and in California, including Los Angeles. The film opened #4, behind holdover hit Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, fellow new release The Chronicles of Riddick and holdover hit Shrek 2, to a 21.7 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent one more weekend in the top 5 (#5) and grossed 75.3 mil. $ (37.1 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were 17.4 mil. $ (8.6 %) and Spain with 10.1 mil. $ (5 %). Roger Ebert gave it a 3/4 star review, translating to two notches over this one. Despite Murray's later story about his involvement (given in 2010 in GQ magazine), he returned with Meyer and Love Hewitt for flop sequel Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (2006). Hewitt returned with Zoom (2006). Murray returned first in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004). Garfield is rotten at 14 % with a 3.60/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Garfield?