I Know What You Did Last Summer

Starring: Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe, Freddie Prinze Jr.
Directed by: Jim Gillespie
Released: Sony Pictures Entertainment, 1997

This one was sold as a quick fix for the teen horror crowd that didn't get enough thrills and pretty "Party of Five" cast members with 1996's Scream. Written by Kevin Williamson (who also wrote the delightfully self-aware script for Scream) and based on Lois Duncan's book, Last Summer tells the story of four teens who, in a night of drunken fun, hit a stranger with their car and dump the body in the sea. As the title implies, of course, the fun doesn't stop there, and much running and screaming follows. But where Scream separated itself from the genre by acknowledging all of the pitfalls of the horror movie, Last Summer wants to be taken seriously -- which doesn't really work as Jennifer Love Hewitt and Sarah Michelle Gellar traipse around in revealing clothing spewing Williamson's suddenly tacky supply of dialogue. A sensation among teenage audiences only for the cast involved and the vague connection to Scream in the horror revolution of 1997.