Most slasher chase scenes are excessive impression however low emotion. They hit you with adrenaline, rigidity, the basic run on your life vitality, after which, nearly inevitably, a predictable finish. However I Know What You Did Final Summer season breaks that mildew. It gave us Helen Shivers, and greater than that, it constructed a complete sequence round one thing uncommon in slasher movies: hope. Not simply hope within the summary, however that sharp, flickering variety that flares if you’re nearly protected– the sort that cuts the deepest when it’s snatched away.
Most slasher chase scenes construct towards a grim, predictable finish. Characters dash, stumble, and conceal, however the rigidity nearly all the time comes from understanding their destiny is sealed. What makes Helen’s chase so hanging is the way it defies this expectation. She fights again, outsmarts her killer, and inches nearer to security in a means that feels earned and actual. The scene sustains this fragile hope longer than most, making the second it’s taken away all of the extra gut-wrenching.
Helen’s chase scene is without doubt one of the most tightly constructed, emotionally loaded sequences in trendy slasher historical past, and one way or the other it by no means will get the credit score it deserves. Individuals keep in mind Sarah Michelle Gellar within the promenade costume– a picture that inevitably brings to thoughts her function as Buffy, whose iconic episodes like The Promenade and Homecoming additionally mix teenage rituals with horror and excessive stakes. However not like Buffy’s triumphant battle, Helen’s sequence is a gradual, brutal unraveling. They keep in mind the alleyway, the fireworks, the promenade evening aesthetic. However they don’t usually discuss how brutal the modifying is– the way in which each reduce looks like a heartbeat accelerating after which skipping. Or how the scene stacks rigidity like a survival countdown, piling on obstacles and false hope, each just a bit extra determined than the final. Or how, only for a second, you actually consider she’s going to make it.
Although Helen Shivers’ chase in I Know What You Did Final Summer season feels emotionally distinct, it shares a artistic lineage with one other iconic sequence: the opening scene of Scream. Each had been written by Kevin Williamson, whose masterful means to stretch out suspense and craft devastating close to escapes shines by in every. Casey Becker’s loss of life is a chilly, calculated shock– a star killing second that rewrote the principles of horror. Helen’s, in distinction, is a slow-burn heartbreak. We spend the complete movie attending to know her, watching her falter, battle again, and hope for survival, which makes her loss really feel deeply private. The place Casey’s loss of life serves to show some extent, Helen’s is a tragic consequence of silence and disbelief. Williamson crafted each with considerate orchestration, however their emotional impacts couldn’t be extra totally different.
All of it begins on the stage of the Croaker Queen pageant, a reputation that when felt like innocent small city kitsch, however now lands with grim irony. Helen watches nervously from the wings as Barry stands guard above her. Their chemistry nonetheless lingers. They’re not again collectively, not precisely, however one thing’s softened between them. There’s a sort of security in the way in which they take a look at one another– wordless, possibly even a little bit hopeful. She tosses him a look. He provides one again. It’s quiet, but it surely means one thing. However then, simply as with every horror story, that fragile second is shattered. The fisherman seems behind Barry, chilly and relentless, and kills him in what looks like plain sight.
Helen’s scream pierces the chaos. The second explodes into panic, however one way or the other, no person appears to care, not really. Probably the most irritating, infuriating a part of this scene isn’t simply Barry’s loss of life. It’s how Helen is dismissed, handled like a hysterical little one quite than somebody sounding the alarm. Viewers members bodily maintain her again. Even the cop acts dismissively, and that is likely to be probably the most devastating half: the people who find themselves supposed to maintain you protected don’t consider you till it’s too late.
Helen is shoved into the again of a police automotive and despatched dwelling. On the way in which, she pleads with the officer, her voice shaking however clear. She tells him precisely what she noticed, that the killer is actual and nonetheless on the market. However he laughs, really laughs. “Did he use the same hook to cut all your hair off?” Prefer it’s humorous. Like her worry is just a few dramatic aftershock of a foul haircut. It’s so dismissive, it’s insulting. She’s terrified, and he turns it right into a punchline. She begs him to take her significantly. Then a damaged down truck blocks the alley.
We all know what’s coming. Helen is aware of. However the cop doesn’t. He steps out to analyze, and certain sufficient, the fisherman strikes once more. Helen is left completely alone.
Trapped at the back of the cruiser, Helen fights with all the pieces she has. She kicks on the home windows, struggles with the locks, her desperation rising extra tangible by the second. The percentages really feel stacked towards her. However then, with uncooked willpower, she manages to flee, on damaged glass no much less. She bursts out into the alley, working onerous with the fisherman stalking behind her– gradual and regular, like loss of life itself. She races towards her dad and mom’ division retailer. The door is locked. She screams pleading for her sister, Elsa, to open it.
Elsa lastly lets her in, irritated and dragging her ft. However Helen is aware of they don’t have time. “Do what I say, goddamn it!” she shouts, panicked and breathless. It’s not simply worry– it’s frustration. No person has listened to her all evening, and now her personal sister is transferring too gradual.
They handle to lock the entrance entrance, however the reduction barely lasts. The again door is breached. The killer is inside. And Elsa by no means stood an opportunity.
This shift from frantic escape to uncanny horror is the place the scene deepens. Helen is thrust right into a nightmare panorama crammed with mannequins wrapped in plastic, frozen and faceless. The chilly showroom feels eerily acquainted. It took me again to moments from Vacationer Entice or After Hours, these unusual, suspended areas the place the inanimate instantly feels conscious.
Helen doesn’t run. She strikes slowly now, descending the steps after Elsa’s scream, each step cautious, cautious. The trip-hop beat of 2Wicky fades into nothing, and instantly, it’s silent. She’s surrounded by mannequins draped in plastic– faceless, their shapes blurred and obscured, however Helen is aware of all too nicely what lies beneath. She walks amongst them like she’s in a minefield, half anticipating one to lurch ahead. After which one does. The fisherman. The protected house Helen hoped for has become a entice. And one way or the other, that makes what’s coming really feel all of the extra inevitable.
Regardless of the fear, Helen survives the encounter and escapes upstairs on a pull-rope elevator, pulling herself as much as the highest flooring. There, extra mannequins stand silently, eerily lined up within the stillness. Then, eventually, a window. A glimmer of escape. She takes a leap of religion, actually, leaping right into a dumpster under. Bloodied and breathless, however alive. The celebration, the parade, the protection she’s been working towards are simply blocks away.
And for a second, it actually looks like she’s going to make it. Julie arrives on the pageant. The seats are empty.
In the meantime, Helen runs by the alley, drawn towards the distant lights and fireworks. The sounds of pleasure and celebration are excruciatingly shut. Security is inside attain. She slows. She hears one thing. A beat of hesitation. And that single second turns into her undoing.
All of us do it. Yell on the display screen, “Don’t stop, keep running!” However she does. And one way or the other, even now, it nonetheless will get to you. As a result of she sees the lights, she sees the individuals. She is aware of she’s shut. And nonetheless, she appears to be like again. Not as a result of she’s careless, however as a result of she’s human. It’s a fundamental response. One which wouldn’t matter in a fairer world. However right here, it prices her all the pieces.
She turns again towards the sound, only for a second. And when she turns ahead once more, he’s there. The fisherman grabs her. It’s over.
She dies inside attain of the parade. Inside earshot of the music. Simply steps from security, celebration, and lightweight. It’s not simply that she doesn’t make it. It’s how shut she comes. The chase doesn’t finish in chaos. It ends in quiet devastation. And that’s what stays with you.
The killer doesn’t simply take her life. He takes the chance. Her hope, her effort, her sheer will to outlive– none of it mattered. Not as a result of she wasn’t sturdy sufficient. However as a result of nobody listened.
Helen all the time felt like a remaining lady within the making. She had the arc. She had the expansion. And she or he fought like hell to earn it. Individuals linked together with her, not simply because she was performed by Sarah Michelle Gellar, however as a result of she carried that very same spark. That very same battle. She deserved to dwell. However this wasn’t Buffy. There’s no supernatural energy, no good stake, no last-minute twist to save lots of her.
This time, she did all the pieces proper and nonetheless didn’t survive. That’s the actual intestine punch right here. Not that she died. However that she nearly didn’t.
