“Well, actually, honey, you know how terrified I am of your IQ, but it’s an urban legend, American folklore, and they all usually originate from some real-life incident.”
Ray- I Know What You Did Last Summer
It’s hard not to compare the teen slasher flicks of the 90s to each other, but I’m going to ask you to step back from that. Scream is the epitome of sendup cinema, and I Know What You Did Last Summer is the culmination of Hollywood’s assault on teen horror. Both films are great. Despite the similarities, Urban Legend is something completely different.
Urban Legend was the mind child of Silvio Horta and was directed by Jamie Blanks. Horta’s script isn’t a masterpiece but read it because it’s one of the best horror scripts I’ve ever read. Urban Legend is the perfect example of why a great script doesn’t make a great film. It takes a great cast and a great director to make a great film. Unfortunately, Blanks is a terrible director, and the cast is a huge disappointment.
This cast is packed to the brim with excellent teen actors. Much like Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer, Urban Legend cast up and coming TV actors and few other recognizable faces to fill out the cast. The problem here is Blanks fails to build any tension and makes every male character into a blithering idiot. Jared Leto, Joshua Jackson, Tara Reid, Danielle Harris, and Robert Englund are merely archetypes of characters, and the director doesn’t allow them to breathe.
The casting of Rebecca Gayheart (the Noxema Girl, remember her) is perfect. She amazingly dominates this movie. But the casting of Alicia Witt as the lead was a huge misstep. Witt is a wonderful actress, but this role wasn’t for her. She lacked the vulnerability of Neve Campbell and the cute innocence of Jennifer Love Hewitt.
The actual plot of Urban legend is fascinating. The killer prefers to stage their kills around urban legends like “someone’s in your backseat” and “don’t mix pop rocks with a carbonated drink”… or drain cleaner. The problem with the killer is it doesn’t have a classic mask or killing tool. The outfit is a less than scary winter jacket?
After it’s all said and done, Urban Legend’s script making it worth watching. The killer reveal is on par with Scream, and I could even argue it’s better. Rebecca Gayheart is a scene-stealer, and the last act is riveting. Urban Legend didn’t change the genre as it should have, but it is an effective horror film.
