Retro Review: Urban Legend (1998)

The horror genre had fallen into a post-Scream slump when Urban Legend came out. Wes Craven's Scream movies were so popular, every genre filmmaker was trying to cash in on their success. So what we got was a long line of self-aware slasher movies that featured a pretty, young cast of TV stars menaced by a killer.

Think the medium after John Carpenter's Halloween came out, and you get the idea. Not a bad thing, as long as you weren't the fifth or sixth carbon copy down the road. Fortunately for Urban Legend, it wasn't.

Urban Legend is pretty dated. It looks, feels and plays like a late '90s horror movie. Very polished, lots of self-referential nods to the genre and, in this case, urban legends. There's a third-act reveal about who the killer is and, of course, the motive behind it all is directly linked to our hot survivor girl.

Spoiler alert.

Taken for what it is, Urban Legend is still fun. At least horror hadn't been relegated to PG-13 yet. We get gore, which is nice. And yes, Rebecca Gayheart, Alicia Witt and Tara Reid are yummy! It's also great seeing genre vets Robert Englund, Danielle Harris and Brad Dourif in one movie.

It's hard to say too much more about the film. Urban Legend is what it is. You dig it as such, or you don't. I quite liked it when it hit theatres back in 1998, and don't mind it today, although the tropes don't hold up as well now. This is unlike some '80s slashers, which are still a boat load of fun.

I'm giving it a Bad, and moving on.

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