Starring: Madelyn Cline, Chase Sui Wonders and Jennifer Love Hewitt
Directed by: Jennifer Kaytin Robinson
Rated: R
Running Time: 111 minutes
Sony Pictures
Our Score: 3 out of 5 Stars
There’s not a deep well of nostalgia for “I Know What You Did Last Summer,” even though I fall squarely in its target demographic. While the 1997 film probably played at countless slumber parties, I was more interested in ‘80s slashers like “Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan” and “A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors.” That’s not to say I skipped the original and its 1998 sequel. I just never went deeper with the 2006 direct-to-video sequel or the short-lived Amazon series. That said, nostalgia is a powerful thing, and I may have enjoyed this 2025 reboot/sequel more than it probably deserves.
The formula remains unchanged: a group of teens does something terrible and tries to cover it up, only to be stalked by a killer in a fisherman’s raincoat. This time, the inciting incident involves a group of five young adults causing a car to veer off a cliff and into the ocean, thanks to one of them goofing around in the street while high. It’s a shaky start, not just because the setup feels contrived, but because it raises questions about whether they’d even be charged with murder under existing law. It might’ve been cleaner, and way more relevant, to have them hit someone while distracted by TikTok or shopping on Etsy.
The first 30 minutes are a slog, nearly nap-worthy, but things pick up once the hook-wielding fisherman shows up and makes a mess with a harpoon. From there, the film taps into its nostalgia engine. Freddie Prinze Jr. returns with a seaman’s beard, weathered charm, and the same heartthrob energy that made him famous. Jennifer Love Hewitt, now playing a psychology professor, also makes a welcomed return. With a dead serious face, she gives the teens predictably awful advice that works perfectly in this kind of film. At this point, I was fully on board this sinking ship, content to go down with it. Because while this isn’t a good movie, it is pretty damn fun.
That fun comes in spite of a script littered with pointless side characters, wandering subplots, and character decisions so illogical they’d make a puzzle book combust. The tone swings wildly from serious to silly, and the attempts at humor mostly fall flat. Even the film’s biggest “wink” moment lands with the laughter and joy of a tax audit. A tighter runtime might’ve helped, but instead the film drags longer than necessary, testing your patience between the kills.
Like the 1997 original, this 2025 edition still lives in the shadow of “Scream,” chasing that meta-slasher magic nearly 30 years later. And while it never matches “Scream’s” cleverness, there is a sense of fun that seeps through, especially during the kill sequences. The deaths are satisfyingly brutal, and the film actually does a better job crafting a believable killer than the original.
It’s not a genre-defining entry like “In a Violent Nature,” nor is it as viciously funny as “The Monkey,” but it comfortably lands in the middle of the 2025 horror pack. There are better horror films out this year, but there are far worse, too.