'Urban Legend'
by Simon Calloway
Cast: Alicia Witt; Jared Leto; Rebecca Gayheart; John Nevill; Robert England.
DVD Widescreen 2.35:1/Standard/Making-Of Featurette/Cast Bios/Dolby 5.1
In the upteenth slasher flick Hollywood has rushed out to the multiplexes since Scream smashed its way to the top of the box office in 1996, Urban Legend stands as either malarkey or a camp classic. I view it as both.
It opens in the tradition of "the girl gets it" with a women driving alone on a desolate road in the middle of nowhere, during a thunder storm. She goes to a run-down gas station, but is forced to go inside for the creepy attendant (Brad Dourif) says that her credit card won't work. When she does what he says, he attacks her, she escapes, and, bingo, she gets her head chopped off.
The film then takes us to a small university in Maine, where the local school newspaper reporter (Leto) claims that the girl was killed based on an urban legend. Everyone thinks he is crazy, except for smart Natalie (Witt, who, if she keeps her cards right, could become a Jamie Lee Curtis of the `90s) who believes him and is attacked by a stranger wearing a big, bulky coat, hood and all, carrying an axe!
After several more attacks and bloody murders, Natalie and reporter Paul try to find who the killer is and which urban legend he will use next.
Urban Legend reminded me of Scream many times, but not in the sense that Legend is a blunt rip-off, but in small details: The big frat house party that takes place at the end of the movie; the leading lady being the prime target of the psycho; the scene where a girl is being chased inside a radio station, which feature enormous sound-proof windows (Scream 2) for the killer to surprise her.
Legend isn't fresh in the brains department, but, lo, it is a lot of fun. It's stylishly directed by newcomer Jamie Blanks and is probably the best horror film featuring a masked maniac since the Scream movies and Halloween: H20. We can safely pass on Disturbing Behavior and Bride of Chucky.
The killer's identity is very hard to figure out, and when you think you know, you really don't. I was disappointed with the revealing of the murderer and the cause for the campus slaughter, yet, the actor/actress makes such fun of the role the thin plotline sort of creeps away from you.
Urban Legend isn't great, but the amount of sustained scares and the way the film is shot, it isn't the worst way to spend two hours. But, for a real treat in college carnage, rent Scream 2.
*** ~TeenViews (c) 1999~
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