Scream 4 (2011)

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, Emma Roberts

Have I Seen it Before: For whatever reason, I have a strong memory of seeing the film at some point, but just like with Scream 3 (2000) I have no memory as I begin this screening of who the killer is. So, I guess it’s all new to me again.

Did I Like It: Which clearly means the film didn’t make much of an impression at the time, right?  While Craven and company probably left well enough alone for long enough after forcing the series into the shape of a trilogy, and there should probably be enough to say about the state of horror at that moment, right?

Well, is there that much new in horror in 2011? You have the Paranormal Activity (2007), and by that point even the Saw (2004) franchise, and not a lot else. Aside from some nascent film nerds/vloggers, the film doesn’t veer into the territory of found footage. There is even less to be said for the rise of torture porn. Although, if Scream 4 had come hot on the heels of Scream 3 in the early 2000s, I could easily see this sequel being weighed down by the unrelenting wave of The Blair Witch Project (1999). 

We’re all got off light that stuff like The Human Centipede (2009) didn’t more thoroughly enter the collective consciousness. For a number of reasons. If there’s a reference to that kind of crap in this film, my memory blissfully omitted it.

The most damning thing I think I have to say about the film is that I reach the end of the review with not enough to say to meet the length requirements for these reviews. It doesn’t have enough to say to recommend itself, and I don’t have much to say about it in turn. An endless unravelling sequence taking the piss out of endless sequels in the film’s opening minutes don’t justify the whole affair. It’s a shame—but not an unrelenting one—that Craven ended his career with something just bereft enough of innovation to be… fine.

Scream 3 (2000)

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox Arquette, Patrick Dempsey

Have I seen it Before: …yes?

Did I Like it: And the answer to that question brings us to the real answer to this one. Scream 3 is so intangible that if I have seen it at some point in the last twenty years, then at the very least its final act has completely disappeared from my memory. That at least maintained that singular quality of the series, where I am watching through the proceedings and I’m legitimately certain that everyone is the killer*, and I’m never quite on target.

So, the essential fun of a Scream movie is present, but whereas Scream 2 (1997) felt like the natural follow up to the original, this film is consistently trying to make a case for itself, but the parts never quite equal—to say nothing of exceeding—their sum. Horror trilogies aren’t really a thing (indeed, even this series shed those confines at the earliest opportunity), so making a comment about the conventions of a cinematic triptych ring hollow. The jokes about Hollywood of the late-90s/early-00s ring hollow either due to age or the fact that they weren’t terribly inspired to begin with.

Ultimately, the film is left to rely on its slasher bona fides, which have never (and as yet, will never) be the series best foot to put forward.

Much of these elements failed to inspire much memory in me, so I’m willing to answer the first question by saying, ultimately, I had somehow missed Scream 3 for all of these years… And it was some mild fun to take it for what I’m 65% sure is the first time. 

Which then brings us to Scream 4 (2011), which isn’t going to get off as light.

*Including series protagonists Sydney (Campbell), Gale (Cox Arquette), and Dewey (Arquette), all of whom I’m strangely holding out hope will eventually pick up the mask, voice changer, and whatever sharp object is nearby in one of these movies.

Scream 2 (1997)

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, Sarah Michelle Gellar

Have I Seen it Before: Yes? Of all the sequels to Scream (1996), this is the one for which I have the most memory.

Did I Like It: Honestly, this one just might be the best film in the series. Let’s review that statement for a bit. Scream 2 is not just the best Scream sequel (that I’ve seen so far; watch this space for the latest Scream (2022). It is even better than the original. 

The first film tries to play with the tropes of the genre, sure, but mainly accomplished being a dim echo of Halloween (1978). Here, perhaps the horror sequel as a species is low-hanging fruit, but that just means there should be more hits than misses. Sure, it can be difficult to reckon with the fact, in iffy tradition, this one comes back around to the fact that often, people of color (Jada Pinkett and Omar Epps) are the first to die in horror and sci-fi**, the fact that the world of Woodsboro even has black people is at least a step in the right direction.

It does hit more than it misses, but that is not the film’s secret weapon. When it comes to the various villains of the franchise, Skeet Ulrich, Scott Foley, Emma Roberts and… ?*, is there any casting of a horror movie heavy that is better than Laurie Metcalf as mother Loomis? If there is, I can’t think of it. Sure, Timothy Olymphant shows up and fills a Billy-esque role in the proceedings, but he is incidental, which only makes the mystery all the more satisfying.

*I’m thinking Neve Campbell’s got to step up. Maybe, maybe David Arquette.

**Commenting on it feels like a hoary cliche itself, and I think the far more reliable trend is that people of color are often dying in service of white people, which doesn’t make anything any better.

Scream (1996)

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, Skeet Ulrich

Have I Seen it Before: I mean, I was alive and in my adolescence for at least part of the 90s, so I don’t really see how I would get to this point without having seen it, but I digress.

Did I Like It: It’s hard to look at the film twenty-five years since without dwelling at least for a moment on just how much this film has wrought, and it for which it will receive no opportunity to do so. It injected new life into the horror genre, but that renaissance (including this film’s sequels) wore its welcome all too quickly. Thirteen Ghosts (2001), anyone? Dare I say, Halloween H20 (1998), a film that doubled back on the references in this film. Scientists hoped such a paradox/ouroboros would cause the rift this film created to collapse in on itself and set the timeline right.

What? Oh, also it provided the perfect model for the Harvey Weinstein money maker and allowed that guy to continue on unscrutinized for two decades. So, maybe this wasn’t the best thing that ever happened to the movies.

But I’ll be damned if much of the movie still works after all of this time, despite what I can’t help think is an overwhelming amount of tinkering on the part of the Weinsteins. The vagaries of 90s movies couldn’t snuff out Craven’s capabilities entirely. The references are one thing, and their appeal becomes thinner and thinner with each passing year, but it’s the final act of the film that I think keeps people coming back to the film after all this time. The tension, the shifting realization as to who the murder actually is, and that tape delay on the footage makes this the kind of film Hitchcock might have made during the era. The last reel of this film works so well, I very nearly forget that there is no way Halloween (1978) was playing the entire time during these killings without interruption until Matthew Lillard bites it.

Nearly.