First season
Based on a classic of youth horror cinema from the 90s, the new Amazon Prime Video series is more committed to drama than pure horror
Youth horror cinema does not lose its ability to draw attention to its potential target when it comes to going through the box office, in addition to operating in domestic format, or on video on demand, as is labeled the fact of watching movies at home in the times that run. The platforms strive to premiere new series and films with fear as a flag, nurturing the fast horror cinema that has given milestones in the history of the genre, phenomena such as the fever for Freddy Krueger or ‘Friday the 13th’ in the 80s or slashers with a teenager spirit that drew attention in the 90s and the beginning of the century, in the vein of ‘Final Destination’, ‘Urban Legend’ or ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’, later turned into sagas. The Blumhouse production company, experts in the field, maintains the flame today with titles such as ‘Happy day of your death’ or ‘Truth or dare’, where adolescents fall like flies due to paranormal causes, one after another, suffer the martyrdom of the serial killer on duty or the umpteenth hereditary curse. It is not surprising that in this everlasting scenario, where fashions come and go, or never left -soon comes the new ‘Scream’-, someone has decided to rescue some success from yesteryear with a schematic plot, where hormones and blood meet its balance, to transfer it to our days.
‘I know what you did last summer’ has been the film of choice that has led to a series of new red vintage supported by Amazon Prime Video, despite the fact that the original film was nothing to write home about. Clear debtor of the pull of ‘Scream’, not in vain both scripts were signed by Kevin Williamson, an expert in mixing puberty and cruel instincts (from ‘Dawson grows up’ to ‘Vampire Chronicles’, going through ‘Kidnapping Miss Tingle’ or the vindicable ‘The Faculty’), the release amassed good fortune in the theater circuit for several weeks in the US, revealing itself as a 90s reference title, with famous young faces of the time, including Jennifer Love Hewitt or Sarah ‘Buffy’ Michelle Gellar. The serialized remake starts from a similar premise, a tragic car accident on a night out ends with a death to hide, but adds more information to the main characters and their relationship, with the inevitable intention of stretching the gum, the main problem of a story that has fewer spectacular deaths than imaginable given the starting material. Until the shocking end of the second chapter there is no hint of terror and hemoglobin -the gore is late, although it enters through the front door-, in an approach that seeks a wide audience, being able to lose the followers of the genre along the way, lengthening the plot too much when loading the inks in the drama.
Young adult
‘I know what you did last summer’ takes itself too seriously, unlike the original film and its sequel, where they attended to a simple scheme, feeding the mystery and the scares without looking for any depth in the main cast. Sara Goodman, collaborator in the adaptation of the comic ‘Preacher’ to a real image, leads the concept of the new series, eight chapters where the main difference with respect to the original proposal is in the arrival of new technologies and their implantation in our society. Impossible to separate mobile phones and social networks from today’s youth. The characters communicate through the cell phone and their reflection in fiction breaks the rhythm. It is not easy to integrate internet abuse into a fluid story, especially when the presentation of the main roles is extremely slow. The intrigue finds it difficult to start, the twists are not shocking and there is an abuse of repeated flashbacks to underline the behavior of the characters, played without fuss by Madison Iseman (‘Duo of queens’), Brianne Tju (‘Light as a feather’ ), Bill Heck (‘The Ballad of Buster Scruggs’), Ezekiel Goodman (‘Dragonfly’), Ashley Moore (‘Popstar’), Fiona Rene (‘Underwater’), Cassie Beck (‘Joe Bell’) and Brooke Bloom ( ‘Story of a marriage’), among others.
It does not feed the hitch ‘I know what you did last summer’, although it manages to elaborate a forceful main profile, to the detriment of the secondary characters, clichés without much foundation, despite the footage squeezed to reel information about the fundamental theme that backs it up. What happens: everyone keeps secrets (as in ‘Gossip Girl’, with less grace). There is no prior tension in the murders, then shaking the viewer is not the goal. Nor does it resemble ‘Euphoria’ or ‘Betty’, portraying a generation -with cheap scenes, even ridiculous, of sex and drugs-, and opts for an aesthetic to use, despite being in the direction of Craig William Macneill, more showered in ‘Them’ or ‘Chilling Adventures of Sabrina’. In short, the proposal does not find its place, and may be more interesting to a viewer interested in youth soap operas than to fans of truculence. The young adult label weighs on him.
‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ is available on Amazon Prime Video.
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