I KNOW HOW MANY RUNS YOU SCORED LAST SUMMER

Australia, 2008, 80 minutes, Colour.
Jai Koutrae, Stacey Edmonds, Az Jackson, David Gambin, Ben Paul Owens, Aaron Scully, Alex Sideratos, James Winter, Otto Heutling, Brendan Arlington, Doug Turner.
Directed by Stacey Edmonds and Doug Turner.

Clearly, with this title, the echoes are of the horror films from the United States, I Know What You Did Last Summer and variations on that theme.

This is a tongue-in-cheek small-budget Australian variation, drawing on audience interest in cricket (though not necessarily relying on cricket except for some scenes of the game and the use of sharpened stumps and spiked balls as murder weapons).

This is a film that appears at fright fests around the world. It is for horror fans only, especially those who enjoy some tongue-in-cheek with their horror.

We are shown some bullying at a school and the bullied man going to England, getting a degree, returning to wreak his revenge on the bullies. They, in fact, are a motley crowd of ordinary Australians, from hairdressers to addicts to military service.

The central character is a rather obnoxious policeman, played by Jai Koutrae. He is called in to investigate the murders – and there are some gruesome scenes of the murders themselves as well as some close-ups of the victims – with the usual 21st century variation on gory and bloodthirsty sequences. He is joined by a British policewoman, played by Stacey Edmonds, who turns out to be the twin sister of the murderer and helping him in his quest. There are various killings but the police round up the remaining members of the school class and take them to a secure spot – needless to say, not secure in the least. Some of them wander about, some of them run risks, they are all murdered.

The main policeman has an offsider who turns out in the end to be the main bully. He didn’t seem at all like this at the beginning and it is rather a surprise to see him revealed as the mastermind at the end.

The dialogue is sometimes corny, sometimes cheesy, but probably sufficient for this kind of film. The acting is not particularly good – except for some of the very minor roles, like the police chief at the police station. However, the poor acting is also the style of this kind of B-budget film.

With the small budget, Stacey Edmonds and Doug Turner, writing, producing, directing, editing and performing, do a competent job for this kind of disposable film.

For film buffs, it is very much in the vein of so many of the films coming from the United States, the slasher movies – but, as the first decade of the 21st century went on, most film industries started to imitate these American slasher films. There were many such films made in Australia – some of the better ones were The Clinic and Storage. However, this is a contribution to Australian exploitation cinema.