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I Know Who Killed Me (2007)

Originality isn't dead. I know because once in a while, you encounter films like I Know Who Killed Me. Get ready for one of the most preposterous and far-fetched plots you’ve ever seen.

Aubrey Fleming (Lindsay Lohan) is the latest victim of a serial killer terrorizing New Salem. The maniac kidnaps young women, amputates their limbs (well, only certain limbs), and then reattaches them so that he can take them apart and put them back together over and over again, eventually dumping the bodies. Late one night, Aubrey’s body is spotted on the side of the road. Miraculously, she's still alive. When interrogated by the police about what happened to her, she insists her name is Dakota, and that she's never heard of Aubrey.

At first, you think you've got this movie figured out. Then it surprises you by pulling moves no one in their right mind would've thought of. In hindsight, this story is both ludicrous and predictable. The problem is you can't wrap your brain around its logic. “There’s no way that person could be the killer.” “Of course he’s wrong. If that's true, then none of this makes ANY sense”. Even with this warning, there’s no way you could be fully prepared for the incoming madness.

I assumed this film was considered bad because of its graphic scenes of torture, or for the shots of Lindsay Lohan playing a stripper. If you’re checking in to see the former "Mean Girls" star get dismembered, you’ll be disappointed. Are the shots of the killer going to town on her body gratuitous? Sure, but there aren't that many of them, and the way it’s done is so silly I doubt you’ll need to avert your eyes. Always wanted to see Lohan as a pole dancer? Too bad she doesn’t take off her clothes. I Know Who Killed Me can’t even be sleazy when it needs to be.

Heavy-handed symbolism is ever-present in IKWKM. Blue i used to draw attention to clues about what’s going on but it isn't necessary at all. Everything it "says" is so obvious you’d have to be blind to miss it. We've seen it done well elsewhere (M. Night Shyamalan, famously). Here, it’s overdone like a teenage girl in an incinerator. You'll exhaust every single blue pun you can think of before you hit the halfway mark. Without this ammunition for jokes, you'll be stuck gazing at the lousy special effects. The now disabled Dakota/Aubrey is given a fully poseable prosthetic hand that works exactly like a real limb, complete with a glove that perfectly simulates human flesh. It's obviously so the SFX department could be spared the trouble of altering the actress's digits in every single shot.

We’re not only talking bad, we’re talking legendary bad. So consistently awful no amount of preparation can get you mentally ready for the experience of watching this plot pulled right out of Arkham Asylum’s most degenerate inmates. So why the half star? Because I Know Who Killed Me is a glorious mess that's so predictable it circles around again to become unpredictable. Its square-brain logic makes you feel simultaneously like a genius and an idiot. I would never dream of recommending it but was, in a perverted way, gripped throughout. (On DVD, October 4, 2015)