Movie Showdown: I Know Who Killed Me vs. Krull

A couple of weeks ago during a 2 a.m. feeding of our newborn I came to the realization that even though we have something like 500 television channels, there's nothing on at that time of day.

Well, obviously there's programing airing. What I mean is that there is very little that's actually worth watching. So I find myself exploring the upper reaches of the channel lineup -- you know, between Channel 216 (the Biography Network) to Channel 288 (the Independent Film Channel) .

Anyway, as I surfed these esoteric airwaves, I landed on two movies that were airing simultaneously: Krull and I Know Who Killed Me.

At first glance both movies seemed to be equally bad, and I kept flipping between them during commercial breaks and the (many) slow parts. But as my thumb became sore from mashing the "last channel" button on the remote, I thought that there must be some way to determine which movie is worse and just finish watching the least bad movie for the rest of the early morning.

So I looked at both movies according to four criteria to come up with an answer. Now look, these movies aren't worth watching, let along thinking about. So this isn't meant to be any kind of objective analysis.

Anyway, here's what I came up with:

Production value:
Obviously, I Know Who Killed Me (2007, staring Lindsey Lohan) is a more modern production than 1983's Krull (staring... well, nobody really. But a young Liam Neeson has a minor role with a pretty decent death scene).

Krull has all of the goofy animated "friggen' lasers" and stop motion "special" effects that were cutting edge in the early 1980's (when Members Only jackets were also considered cutting edge) but haven't really stood the test of time.

IKWKM is only better because they used modern camera equipment and the original film hasn't deteriorated through multiple late-night airings (yet). There are some very lame-ass dream sequence effects.

Winner (by default) I Know Who Killed Me. 1 Point

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Acting:
Pretty much a dead heat here. Acting in both movies is so flat it makes Norville "Shaggy" Rogers look like an Oscar nominee. To steal a phrase from Nat X, I've seen better actin' in Tough Actin'® Tinactin®.

Lindsay Lohan lived down to her well-earned reputation as a stripper's actor in IKWKM. She played a psycho, overly sexed split personality potty-mouthed bad girl. I know what you're thinking, quite a stretch for her. And yet even with her copious experience with the material, she somehow found a way to make it seem strained and unbelievable.

But in Krull, the aforementioned Liam Neeson death scene was probably the second best acting job. All of the human actors were upstaged by the giant stop motion spider who guarded The Lady of the Web (seriously, who writes this stuff).

But the biggest disappointment was Neal McDonough, who played Lohan's father in IKWKM. I hoped for more from him since I've like his work in Band of Brothers and Boomtown.

So for Acting, I'll give the nod to Krull only because my expectations were higher for IKWKM.

Winner Krull. 1 Point

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Writing:
At their cores, both story lines are pretty much the same, that being "let's see how lame of a story we can come up with and how long emawkc will watch before hitting the 'last channel' button or jamming the TV remote into his hear."

But on a more superficial level, Krull is your typical epic quest story, where the hero must acquire a special weapon then travel to the boss monster's lair to kill it. It's pretty much what happened in Lord of the Rings, Conan the Barbarian and Super Mario Bros. Because they didn't do any actual writing, producers were free to blow the money that they would have paid writers on building a bunch of the bladed frisbee Glaive weapons to give away at the wrap party.

IKWKM, on the other hand, is your standard split personality psycho killer horror flick. While the concept had some potential, the writing is so tediously contrived that I wanted to freeze off my own limbs with dry ice just to remind myself that I'm still alive. Since they didn't have to pay a writer, they were able to use the money they saved to provide pain relievers to the editors who had to work for hours on the footage.

Winner Krull. 1 Point

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Highlights:
Using the term "highlights" to describe these movies is a little like using the term "sober" to describe KC's annual St. Patrick's Day parade. For IKWKM, I guess the highlight was Lohan's sexy pole dance scene. But given her escapades over the past few years and her level of overexposure (in more ways than one), I can't imagine that there was anything in that scene that most people haven't already seen on TMZ.

For Krull, the highlight is probably be the art direction for the Glaive, a weapon which resembles a starfish that grew steel talons. Still, it's impossible to see how an up-and-coming prince could yield this weapon without losing a few fingers.

So again, this one is a tough decision. But since I'm not a misogynist who likes to see pole-dancing strippers mutilated with dry ice, I'll give the nod to Krull in this category.

Winner Krull. 1 Point

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And the winner is...

So there you have it. By a score of three points to one, Krull beats out IKWKM in this late-night movie showdown. Now, you shouldn't take this as any kind of endorsement of either movie. They're both about as entertaining as an open head wound. But at least the next time producers decide to do a nostalgic 30th Anniversary re-release of Krull, they can use the slogan "Hey, at least it wasn't as bad as I Know Who Killed Me."

tagged: movie, review, Krull, I Know Who Killed Me, glaive, pop culture