I Know What You Did Last Summer

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While it’s fun to go back to the good movies from a bygone era, there is a joy to be had in watching the bad movies from a bygone era – especially the ‘90s slasher flick. Considering that the Scream franchise is up to its seventh movie, Chucky slashed up screens for over two decades, and I Know What You Did Last Summer got a reboot last year, there’s clearly something appealing about this eerie little subgenre. So, eager for some smooth-brained suspense this evening, Partner and I curled up and went back to 1997 with the original I Know What You Did Last Summer.

In a small fishing town, after a 4^th of July parade, a group of teenaged friends have a bit too much fun on the beach and accidentally hit a man on the drive home. Terrified that going to the cops will ruin their futures, they agree to dump the body in the harbour and take the secret to their grave. One year later, they are reunited and their guilt comes back to haunt them, as they begin getting mysterious letters and a strange figure with an angler’s hook starts stalking them. They soon realise that someone knows what they did last year… and they’re not going to let them forget it!

While it lacks the charisma of Ghostface or the suspense of Michael Myers, this classic ‘90s slasher is not without its charm. Arguably a modern take on The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe, the real horror of I Know What You Did Last Summer is actually manufactured by the protagonists/victims themselves, each one trying to process their guilt and post-traumatic stress…unsuccessfully.

The arrival of the first mysterious note sends them down a rabbit hole of trying to find out about the person they killed, thus hoping to find leads as to who the stalker might be. As they find more clues, discover new truths, and get closer to achieving closure, that’s when the tantalising torment turns violent and fear, paranoia, and grief start to overwhelm them: strengthening the allegorical slasher.

The performances are a little shaky, unless someone is yelling in anger or screaming in fear, and the mystery portion of the story itself is pretty flimsy. The enjoyment of this film definitely comes from its stoic adherence to horror rules despite providing some tongue-in-cheek meta about the genre at the beginning. It’s always fun to just groan when the helpless girl runs in the opposite direction of where she should be going or calling which character will be killed next and how. And simple tricks like narrative misdirection and jump scares still serve to make us flinch and exclaim in mild surprise when the ‘twist’ happens.

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I Know What You Did Last Summer is by no means amazing, but it’s a film that does have some intriguing layers to it, making it a perfectly enjoyable Friday night popcorn movie.

Director: Jim Gillespie, 1997

Cast: Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prinze Jr., Ryan Phillippe, Anne Heche, Johnny Galecki, Bridgette Wilson-Sampras, & Muse Watson

Howl

Image credit: IMDb

Moving a step away from the natural monsters that can disembowel us, but still opting for a horror in which everyone makes bad choices and thus create a fun film to yell at, the most recent Friday night couch movie Partner and I did was Howl.

Train guard Joe (Ed Speleers) has been having a rough day: the promotion he wanted went to a jerk who then dumps the graveyard shift onto him, the coworker he fancies declines his invitation to a drink, and the passengers on the last train are rude, belittling, and judgmental. But his day gets a lot worse when the train hits something on the track and the driver goes missing when out investigating. After hearing chilling howls, one of the passengers is attacked, and it falls to Joe to try and keep the peace as they run through their options on how to survive. And all the while there is a terrifying creature trying to get in.

What we’ve got here is a British werewolf movie set on a train. At the very least, this movie has a number of characters who you immediately hate and can’t wait to see dismembered. Having worked in customer service, there is a satisfying edge in watching movies with unreasonable, arrogant, and distasteful customer-characters who you know are going to meet a gruesome end. For Howl, it would have been even better if the lead character didn’t have the personality of a wet blanket. Strike one of this movie is that there are no characters that audiences are inspired to root for.

Strike two is the panicked and desperate script. The visual part of the screenplay is fine with a good number of disturbing monsters attack scenes that turn the stomach and jolt the heart. But the central narrative is weak from the beginning, the chosen environment limits creative solutions for escape, and there is an exposition dump in the middle that raises more questions than it answers. Not to mention the haphazard backstories of a couple of characters that comes to light under the pressure of the outside threat.

And strike three, the monster is revealed way too early. I think this is what caused the already wobbly plot to be completely derailed, as it didn’t work to increase the suspense or spark any sort of narrative development. If anything, it removed a good chunk of the suspense and put the writers into panic when they realised they needed some sort of explanation as to why there’s a pack of werewolves in this England woodland.

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I would only recommend this movie if you are looking for something to get mad at. It’s a film that begins with only the vaguest plot destination in mind and then gets completely derailed through its own lack of creativity. And sin of sins, there’s not even a good ending that brings any sort of closure.

Director: Paul Hyett, 2015

Cast: Elliott Cowan, Rosie Day, Calvin Dean, Sam Griffiths, Shauna Macdonald, Duncan Preston, Ania Marson, Amit Shah, Ed Speleers, & Holly Weston

Into the Grizzly Maze

Image credit: Prime Video

In our recent exploration into the realm of eco-horror we have tended to favour the aquatic terrors of sharks and crocodiles. I think the reason for this is because the underwater world is a frontier that is particularly scary because it’s harder to traverse and investigate and the predators that roam it are absolutely terrifying to behold. But Partner and I decided to give a different environment a go with Into the Grizzly Maze.

The film follows Rowan (James Marsden) who comes back to his hometown to track down a friend who has gone missing. Inevitably, his path crosses with that of his estranged brother Beckett (Thomas Jane), who is trying to trying to preserve the grizzly bear population, but has been tasked with hunting down a grizzly that has been attacking people. The two brothers find themselves, as well as Beckett’s girlfriend, and Rowan’s ex trapped in the labyrinthine Alaskan woodlands being stalked by the same formidable grizzly they are hunting.

Much more of a dramatic eco-horror rather than a rollicking rip-and-tear-until-the-last-man-standing, Into the Grizzly Maze takes the catalyst of a predator threat and uses it to drive the development of the characters and their stories. This is something that we constantly see in horror films: the civility and structure of society breaking down when surrounded by zombies, the calculating judgement of who can be saved and who should be sacrificed where the air’s running out of the submarine being circled by sharks, etc... But admittedly, it only really works if the characters and their backstories are interesting. The social structure under the microscope in this film is the institution of family and what circumstances can make that institution crumble. Rowan is an ex-con and his brother is the town’s local sheriff. Over the coarse of the film we learn the severity of Rowan’s crime as well as the circumstance that brought him there. But it’s very flimsily written, predictable, and doesn’t really inspire any hope for redemption.

The bear itself, like Jaws, is just a particularly large and aggressive bear and the real horror and suspense of the movie actually comes from the trials of the environment, in particular a number of gruesome injuries that (annoyingly but predictably) befall the two female characters.

The performances are all fine: admittedly I imagine it’s very hard to create an engaging character when the script is so lackluster.

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Into the Grizzly Maze is a dramatic eco-horror that takes itself seriously and while there are a few intertwining plots that justify it being a tonally sombre movie ultimately, it’s a mediocre predator movie that fails to really get going.

Director: David Hackl, 2015

Cast: James Marsden, Thomas Jane, Piper Perabo, Michaela McManus, Scott Glenn, & Billy Bob Thornton

Dark Age

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When we think about B-grade movies, in particular B-grade horror movies, we often think about those hokey black and white films of the 1930s made on a shoestring budget with party-plate UFOs on fishing rods. I adore these types of movies because while there is a sincerity and a love behind them, the budget often didn’t support it and it’s really adorable to watch a film where everyone gives it a red-hot go with whatever gear they’ve got.

In the 1980’s Australian cinema added a solid number of horror flicks into the B-grade galaxy thanks to the 10BA Era. For those who don’t know, the 10BA Era refers to movies made during a boom in Australia’s film industry that was fueled by Section 10BA of the Income Tax Assessment Act, which basically offered insane tax deductions for investors of Australian cinema. Basically, Australia was making ridiculous films because we bloody could and while a lot of them became global hits like Crocodile Dundee and Mad Max, most were relegated to the realm of B-movie cult classics. Films such as Dark Age: Australia’s answer to Jaws with a giant croc.

The film follows protagonist Steve Harris (John Jarratt) a park ranger working to protect and maintain the crocodile population. When an unfeasibly huge croc appears and kills a number of people, the pressure is put on Steve by his boss to rid the waters of the beast once and for all. However, the local Aboriginal tribe have a spiritual connection with the croc and with Steve’s help they try to persuade the authorities to let them capture it and bring it back to its original home. But as Steve and his higher ups butt heads, a group of irate poachers are out for the croc’s blood, as a few of their number were among those it killed.

In a nutshell the film is more or less Jaws but set in the outback with a giant saltwater croc. The same frustrating authority figures are more concerned with overseas investors and tourism rather than the at-home cultural degradation that their actions cause, and the same amount of testosterone-fueled idiots (albeit more violent and drunk) are set on decimating an entire species in the hopes of bagging the right beast for the bounty. Running alongside the central narrative of man vs beast, we have the spiritual and far more interesting glimpse into Aboriginal culture and their relationship to the native fauna. While this depiction of indigenous culture is a little dated and culturally appropriated/stereotyped, it nevertheless brings a breath of fresh air to the bloody and beer-stained boat ride that is this film.

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While the last two eco-horror movies I watched had characters that lacked any personality, it’s very easy to immediately hate a bunch of the characters in this film and thus get a sick enjoyment from the crunching sound their bones make when they get snapped in half. The performances are all solid, inspiring you to root for the good guys and really look forward to the villains getting chomped.

Filled with drama, romance, suspense, and action, Dark Age is a sturdy b-grade horror film from Australia’s cinematic repertoire.

Director: Arch Nicholson, 1987

Cast: John Jarratt, Nikki Coghill, Max Phipps, Burnham Burnham, Ray Meagher, Jeff Ashby, Paul Bertram, Ron Blanchard, Gerry Duggan & David Gulpilil

Prey

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In my last post I talked about the rise of the dumb eco-horror movie that we watch if we want something to joyfully yell at. Having watched a movie last night, anticipating that it would be a similar type of romp, I now have to add a disclaimer to my previous mention of this subgenre. The happy-anger we feel at watching these sorts of movies comes, in part, from the feeling that the filmmakers (hopefully) did not set out to make a serious horror flick thus, through bad writing, predictability, and mediocre characters it feels like the level of joy-ranting is justified, even encouraged.

Then there are films like Prey which were clearly made to be taken seriously, explore serious themes about society and its inevitable breakdown in stressful situations, but are just so bad you even get mad that you streamed it and lost over an hour of your life.

Prey follows a group of Americans in Africa who become stranded in the Ngala Reserve after a plane crash. Tension is already rife amongst the group which is made up a pilot who’s a smuggler, a married couple from a Christian missionary who have been threatened by an extremist military gang, a spoilt rich boy on holiday, and his hired guide whom he treats as a servant. With painful death threatening them from every corner, can they work together to survive or will the true, chaotic nature of man break down civility?

Nothing but bad things to say about this movie I’m afraid. It tried to take itself seriously as an eco-thriller, following the tropes of the classic zombie movie except in this case it’s lions. Unfortunately, the script is terribly written, there is no real chance for audiences to become attached to any of the characters, plus an acute lack of backstory which makes them even more unfathomable, oh and it completely flumps the Bechdel Test as both female characters get killed off before they even have the chance to have a conversation.

Like all films Prey had a budget, which clearly went towards securing a couple of celebrity names in the cast. The leftover change went to the predator effects, which is seriously footage of various nature documentaries spliced together (albeit sort of smoothly). The film could definitely have benefited from some form of consultant on the hunting behaviour of lions or the right way to try keep a man conscious after being bitten by a venomous snake. The seismic lack of any authentic predator interaction with the characters pretty much eradicates any suspense or horror that comes from being stalked and threatened with a violent death. To make matters worse, at one point it is clear that the writers lost the thread of the film and just added in more stuff in the hope that it would get everything back on track. Spoiler alert: it didn’t.

Image credit: Filmaffinity

Even if you’re after a dumb predator film to yell at, I would not recommend Prey.

Director: Mukunda Michael Dewil, 2024

Cast: Ryan Phillippe, Mena Survari, Jeremy Tardy, Dylan Flashner, Tristan Thompson, Michaela Sasner, Godwin Asamoah Obeng, Alpha Miknas, Theo Bongani Ndyalvane & Emile Hirsch

47 Metres Down: Uncaged

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More and more in modern cinema, piggybacking has become the ‘it’ trend. Reboots and remakes and spin-offs dominate an increasing number of screens, most often resulting in a clutch of movies that audiences derive pleasure from in yelling at the stupidity of them. One genre in which this has been done so much it’s practically become a subgenre, is horror: particularly the dumb eco horror or ‘natural’ monster movie. Films like 47 Metres Down: Uncaged.

The film follows a pair of teenaged stepsisters who join their friends in exploring the labyrinthine network of caves in a sunken Mayan city. When a pillar collapses, the group becomes separated in the silt cloud and the noise attracts a great white shark that has taken up residence in the deep dark city. Their situation goes from bad to worse when they reunite and discover that they are now hopelessly lost, running low on oxygen, and being stalked by this terrifying predator.

With absolutely no ties whatsoever to 47 Metres Down, another suspenseful shark film in which a cage dive goes wrong, this film is more about the terrifying action rather than the suspense of a predator movie. Loaded with jump-scares and really doubling down on making a hopeless situation even worse, this movie is ridiculous but also kind of scary when you consider the real dangers that do come with things like adventure-diving, underwater excavation, cave exploration, and such like.

This fear-by-imagining-if-you-were-there is really the only thing this movie has going for it. The performances are fine, given that we get no insight into who the characters are and thus, they are all boring, flat characters that don’t inspire any emotional attachment at all. It’s definitely a movie where all the emphasis is on the suspense of the situation and how many jump-scares can be crammed in; the characters take the back seat, lucky to be in the car at all. Some attempt to inspire sympathy for the lead heroine is made at the very beginning during a schoolyard bullying scene, but it’s haphazard and then no further explanation is done on it so it becomes kind of pointless as an opener.

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If you’re after an obvious, predictable, and frustrating shark movie to yell at, then I would recommend 47 Metres Down: Uncaged. Partner and I enjoyed groaning and exclaiming in frustrated disbelief from reel one; and while I don’t believe that is ever the intention of the filmmakers, sometimes you just want a movie that is so bad you can get angry at it. Afterall, yelling and venting is often very cathartic.

Director: Johannes Roberts, 2019

Cast: Sophie Nelisse, Corinne Fox, Brianne Tju, Sistine Rose Stallone, Nia Long, Davi Santos, Brec Bassinger, Khylin Rhambo, & John Corbett

Anaconda

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When you want to get out of the house on Boxing Day but can’t stand the idea of being crushed in a Lion King reenactment during the Boxing Day sales, where do you go? The movies. What could be better than going to see a dumb popcorn movie in the wake of the Christmas aftermath? Honestly, a lot of things but regardless, a dumb comedy-horror hit cinemas on Boxing Day so Partner and I braved the stampedes of the shopping mall and went to see Anaconda.

Griff (Paul Rudd) is a struggling actor pining for the old days when he and his childhood friends would make movies together. Thankfully, his friends are also going through similar mid-life crises so when he proposes remaking their favourite horror film, Anaconda, they are immediately on board. With Doug (Jack Black) directing and Griff and Claire (Thandiwe Newton) starring as the leads, the group heads into the jungle full of hope and excitement. But their dream quickly turns into a nightmare when they find themselves being stalked by an enormous anaconda.

While the poster gives off Jumanji vibes, the film is definitely more like Tropic Thunder: a bloody, rough, and brutal comedy flavoured with not-so-subtle social commentary about the state of cinema and the genre’s penchant for metafiction. The twist of the plot is also very similar in that it’s a group of filmmakers who inadvertently land in the middle of the story they are trying to tell.

The film is very much about the funny, filmmakers-living-the-film plot but there are some thinner narratives about friendship, growing-up, and never giving up on your dreams peppered throughout. A reasonably funny script combined with eco-horror and the gross-out humour that can accompany it does not put Anaconda in the realm of comedy genius, but certainly delivers laughs and cringes.

The performances are all solid, there is definitely a fun and friendly vibe or chemistry that flows through the central cast. It really does feel like a bunch of friends and cinephiles making a movie.

Image credit: Decider

While it’s nothing to write home about, Anaconda is a fun and mindless popcorn movie that delivers respite from the year that has been. Filled with action, suspense, a couple of predictable plot twists, and plenty of comedy, it’s a perfectly adequate way to kill some time.

Director: Tom Gormican, 2025

Cast: Jack Black, Paul Rudd, Thandiwe Newton, Steve Zahn, Selton Mello, Ione Skye, Sebastian Sero, Daniela Melchior, Rui Ricardo Diaz, & Ice Cube