Before I start I just want to say that I am a fan of the Scream Franchise. I grew up watching the films and falling in love with all the weird and wonderful characters of Scream especially Dewey, Gale, Randy and Sidney.
The Scream films to me, back when I watched them as a kid, Mystery films in which one had to keep guessing at who the Killers in the film were and by the end of them I was always surprised by the reveal of the Killers. Of cause since I was a kid I never understood the humour or parodies it made of Slasher films thus never truly understanding the reason Scream was a clever original film.
However, older as I got and taking a heavy interest in the field of films in general I watched the series with that new knowledge of understanding I didn’t possess before and enjoyed the films a lot more than I did before. Instead of getting scared and jumping all the time I was laughing with the characters and their trivia of film jokes and parodies.
I loved Scream as I loved Scream 2 and Scream 3. Yes I loved Scream 3 and unlike everyone else in the whole world been negative towards it, to me the sequels still managed to retain that horror, clever humour and serious tone that made the First Scream so enjoyable.
As a Trilogy, each film brought something new to the table while reusing older ideas but also managing to create interesting stories, scenarios and characters while also managing to wrapping everything up without having to leave the doors open for a sequel and the enjoyment of Scream 3 was seeing everything leading back to Scream and seeing it all wrapped up with a (In My Opinion) good and unexpected twist that concluded the overall series and left the door open for more.
10 YEARS LATER or so our cinema screens are yet again graced by the return of Series creator Wes Craven along with the return of the original surviving cast of Characters, Gale (Courteney Cox), Dewey (David Arquette) and Sidney (Neve Campbell) in SCREAM 4 aka SCRE4M. But does the film manage to hold up a candle next to its predecessors?
Well quiet frankly? No. Not at all and as a fan who wasn’t the least bit hyped or excited for this film to ever see the light of day but holding out some small hope that this film would be just as good as the originals if not better, I left the theatres with nothing but confusion on my face and what I saw.
Going to the cinemas again to watch the film, I came out once more with bitter disappointment and utter hatred for what was delivered. After nearly a decade, that is the best they could come up with? And from Director Wes Craven as well? What a nasty joke.
People are going to say that it’s not a big deal and that it is expected. No sequel truly manages to be better than its predecessor but this is no sequel. This is the forth film/Reboot/Remake with the same cast and director as before and the irony of all this is I’ve seen sequels/reboots/remakes to films from decades ago that ended up been just as good as its sequels if not better than the Original Film.
But Scre4m fails completely in those regards. It fails to offer anything new to the table and completely destroys the essence of what made the Original films so good in the first place. CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. There is none. Any characters introduced are only there to get killed off quickly or to move the plot along to get to the next killing scene.
"New Decade. New Rules. So, does that mean we still get alot of talking scenes yeah?"
No character is given a real moment to shine and the characters of Sidney, Gale and Dewey are completely overshadowed by the whole cast of new characters and underused. In fact Gale and Dewey do nothing what so ever in terms of progressing the plot and are just there for the sake of having familiar faces. Their characters are wasted. And Sidney, while been the MAIN CHARACTER isn’t really given a time to showcase the trauma and damage been done to her.
The plot is about Sidney returning to Woodsboro for a press event of the release of her book and it is then that new killings start to pop up but Sidney isn’t put into any sort of mental or emotional breakthrough like the last films put her through. Here she plays the strong badass heroine and while in some ways that is a good way to show how far Sidney has developed as a person it doesn’t do the overall character any justice. If you took Sidney out of the film, the plot would still be the same.
"If this doesn't work out then I'll settle for writing a autobiography instead."
And the new characters are too many. These range from Kirby (Played by Heroes Claire, Hayden Panettiere) – a somewhat female version of Randy who is the only character who comes off as been somewhat developed and overly liked. Others are Charlie (Rory Culkin) and Robbie (Erik Knudsen), two geeks who are also this films Randy if you like thus revealing the first problem in the cast of characters.
You already have Kirby who is meant to be the hot yet film geek but then you also have the two annoying film geeks and only is that one geek to many, it actually greatly helps to narrow down the fact that obviously that the killer is not Kirby by a long shot but one of the two film buffs.
"Nothing can kill me. Why? Cause I'm fucking Claire from Heroes Bitch, that's why!"
Other new characters include Olivia (Marielle Jaffe) who is meant to be the film’s Hot Girl who gets murdered early on but her character isn’t developed well enough to give a dime about her.
Then there is Rebecca (Alison Brie) who is Sidney’s Publicist and acts as the selfish bitch only looking to cash in on the events happening in the town. And again her character isn’t developed at, only having about two scenes with the last scene finishing and leading to her clashing with the Killer Ghostface and getting stabbed and thrown off the car park roof. Her death scene was probably one of the stupidest scenes in the whole film. She gets trapped in her rental car and has the Killer stalking but has her phone on her. CALL FOR HELP YOU IDIOT!!! If the Killer wanted to smash the window to get you he’d have done it already. NO, DON’T GIVE ME THAT BULLSHIT EXCUSE THAT SHE WAS PANICKING. SCREAM 1 TO 3 HAD MORE LOGIC THAN THIS CRAP!
Another character is Trevor (Nico Tortorella) who plays Jill’s (Emma Roberts) ex-boyfriend who comes off as looking suspicious all the time and making it way too obvious that he is NOT the Killer. In the original scripts he was meant to be someone who beat up his friend and possibly killed him but for the film it was changed to him having taken Jill’s virginity and then having cheated on her and thus explaining why Jill wants nothing to do with him. Again, another character who isn’t developed at all and comes off as been a obvious red herring.
"You wanna do it?"
Other characters are Jill who plays Sidney’s young Cousin (Funny they never mention that Sidney has other family relatives in the previous films. Hmm…why bring in a family in now? Jee, I wonder what the point of it all can be?) and Jill’s Mom Kate (Mary McDonnell) who only has two scenes and very short and isn’t developed at all. Her character, well, what can I say? She isn’t the Killer that’s for sure and her character pretty much serves no purpose whatsoever except for her to be related to Sidney’s mom and been Jill’s mom.
Whatever happened to Sidney’s Dad? He was in the original script and was meant to get killed off I assume? A early rumour was that Sidney returns back home after her Dad is murdered. Interesting to note is the fact that the Killer makes a point to Sidney having left her family behind back home but Jill and Kate were never mentioned or existed during the whole of the previous series and their characters come off forced with one of the main reasons been the most obvious of them all. (I’ll get to that later.)
And then you also have Cop Characters which consists of the annoying and other obvious red herring, Judy Hicks (Marley Shelton) (who takes a fancy to Dewey who is the now Town Sheriff in this film and poses as a possible new love interest for him and foe in Gale’s side), along with the two dumbass, useless Cop Deputies, Perkins (Anthony Anderson) and Hoss (Adam Brody) who also don’t any sort of development at all and act as the two idiots who should’ve been doing their jobs properly but instead play pranks and talk films together which leads them to their deaths.
"Don't touch it! It might explode..."
The Moral of the story? TAKE YOUR JOB SERIOUS AND DO IT PROPERLY WITH PASSION OTHERWISE YOU GET YOUR THROAT SLIT AND A STAB IN THE HEAD WHERE THEN YOU’LL MANAGE TO STILL WONDER OUT AND PUNCH AIR BEFORE EVENTUALLY DROPPING DOWN DEAD AFTER SAYING A STUPID ONE LINER.
“Fuck Bruce Willis” Yeah…too bad that Bruce Willis managed to deliver a awesome Die Hard 4 and still be badass as ever as John McClain. Something the old cast fails to do as their respected characters because if you watch them carefully, they all looked bored as hell to be back.
"Yeah, A Decade Later and I'm still a Yippi Ka-Ya Motherfucking Badass. Can't say the same thing to you buddy."
Of cause given the amount of pressure and stress put on them because of the interfering Studio, it is understandable. But what I can’t accept is these guys couldn’t try harder to at least give a crap. And add in the fact that Dewey and Gale do absolutely nothing in terms of plot, then its understandable the boredom they feel (Along with the fact those two Actor divorced. Sad Times perhaps?)
Dewey is now the Sheriff of the town he used to live in. He went from a dofus to a more cautions man in Scream 2 and finally hero of Scream 3 and he is now back to been a cop but having taken up the duty of been the big boss and respected man he sought to become. However, he does nothing in terms of progressing the plot and is just there. Again, take Dewey out and replace with another person and the plot would still be the same.
Then there is Gale who got married to Dewey and has been living with him ever sense but is now a normal housewife who hasn’t reported or written a book in the last ten years. Seeing how Sidney has gotten popular with the release of her book, Gale seeks to do the same and right here there could’ve been a good plot with Gale turning out to be the Killer because she sought to become famous again and let the power and jealously get into her head, however, this isn’t the case and Gale as much as Dewey fails to serve a real purpose in the film. Again, take her out of the plot and it’d still be the same.
One of the great things about Scream or the Scream Sequels to be more frank was the interactions of Sidney, Gale and Dewey. There many of these scenes and all three worked together to find out who the killers were and became closer in those efforts but here these interactions are short and few.
"Let's see here. We meant on Scream 1. We Dated during Scream 2. We were married doing Scream 3. This time we're divorced for Scream 4. Does this mean we'll hook up again on Scream 5 and die in a freak bloody accident in Scream 6?"
In fact the only scenes with the Trio together is there to only advance the plot and not as a standalone scene to develop these characters further. Yes, we know who they are and what they do but its been ten years for crying out loud and Scream became Scream because of them. They are what made Scream 2 and 3 worth watching. We grew up watching these characters and they grew with us. Ten Years Later and they don’t feel like the characters we know and love.
And again here is one of the things that really bothered me about Scre4m. None of the Trio die. Gale and Sidney get stabbed but none of them die. Sidney gets it three times in the stomach and still bloody lives. I know a lot of people say it’s a good thing and because it changes the rules of films umm…no it doesn’t. Scre4m doesn’t bring anything new to the table. Other films have done it before and done it better.
"I got the Beer. And I got the Film. Now we just need tits. Lots and lots of tits. Pretty please?"
If your aim is to kick start a new trilogy of characters or to just reboot/remake a film then you have to get rid of your old characters. Plus the fact the trio really don’t do much in this then having them in it in the first place was pointless. One of the reasons I thought Scream 2 and 3 were good with other sequels in general is because they have the balls to kill of characters from the previous entries. Scream 2 killed off Randy halfway through. Scream 3 killed off Cotton in the Beginning. These deaths helped to show that even the Trio could die next. But Scream 4 fails do such a thing at all. All the new characters get killed off except for the trio and others. There is no suspense or tension. The only time we feel any of the sort is the end when Sidney is left dead only to be revealed to still be alive in the final act.
"WHAT'S MY NAME BITCH!? WHAT'S MY NAME!?"
Talking about Suspense and Tension, the Opening of Scre4m is one of the most cliché, dragged out Openings I’ve seen in a film in ages. Scream had a Opening that has yet to be topped by other Horror/Slasher films. None of the emotional or mental psychological aspects appeared in Scream 2 whose Opening was more to do with Style instead of substance and Scream 3 trying to retain that aspect of Scream 1 but by adding in the twist of having a previous character get the axe.
But Scre4m’s Opening fails in all aspects. For a film that is meant to parody Horror/Slasher Sequels, it instead goes and parodies INCEPTION. Yes, it tries to be clever and instead just annoys its audience – me in general. Where Inception had the idea of a DREAM IN A DREAM IN A DREAM, Scre4m goes for the MOVIE IN A MOVIE IN A MOVIE route and it’s long and drags out the rest of the film.
"Yeah, I so don't look obviously crazy and insane."
The First part of the Opening is done so well that it should’ve been the real opening kill of the film. It introduces the idea of a Facebook Killer and such and already while not a new idea is something for Scre4m to start with but instead it takes the piss and throws all the character development it just made with the two would be victims out the window.
The next opening is short and stars Anna Paquin and Kristen Bell where it ends quickly with Bell stabbing Anna. OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD…Do it once and it’s pretty clever. Do it Twice and you’re just annoying the audience now. JUST START THE MOVIE ALREADY. WE PAID TO SEE SCRE4M. NOT STAB. What is this? A Parody in a Parody in a Parody? This film is starting to sound like Scary Movie…Oh Wait…Hold that Thought for later on.
The REAL Opening ends as soon as it began. So far about five minutes of my time has been wasted watching two fake endings and none of the emotional depth from the first film is in this. For a Film that is meant to be a Reboot/Remake/ of sorts to the First Scream movie it fails at doing what was done with Scream 1.
What I would’ve done is mix the second and third openings together and instead use the first opening as the real opening but removing that ending kills from it.
"Copy and I'll stab your ass to next year"
Now, to the comment about this been similar to Scary Movie, well, I would say yes and no to that comment. The film is funny but it is no Scary Movie and this is where everything is wrong with Scre4m. It isn’t scary or terrifying at all. It is a joke from beginning to end. Every sentence uttered or action taken is done so to evoke humour for the audience. Where the previous films were funny but done so in a film with a obvious serious tone, nothing in this is serious. Everything is a joke that fails to gather laughter or is just a joke to much.
Not once did I jump when Ghostface and the acting from when someone screamed was a joke. It all seemed forced. The scene where Perkins gets stabbed in the head and wonders out only to utter a one liner is an example of just exactly this film isn’t. It is not a Horror film. It is a Comedy that tries to parody Horrors and again fails at this concept because it is 10 years too late.
If one is looking for a film where they want to laugh then this is it because it terms of delivering humour and releasing the laughter then this film does its job right. In fact its probably the one main reason most people enjoyed it. Just its comedy and not the wittiness and actions of characters and suspense and kills the Scream Franchise was born and raised on.
"Hey Bitch...don't just stand there and look into the camera. Undress already and let's get busy."
Speaking of kills, they are so unsatisfying. A lot of people have been going on about how goring this film is but its not goring and every stab and blood looks fake as any low budget student made. Every person in this film is stabbed, stabbed, stabbed. This is no creativity to the kills and there were a lot of WOW DEATH MOMENTS in the previous ones.
Screams Opening kill was goring for the simple fact that by the end of it, Drew Barrymore looked like a horrid mess. The character of Tatum gets her head squashed. Scream 2 had a Bodyguard on top of a car get his head remade. And let’s not forget that one guy who got blown up along with a whole mansion building. Those were creative deaths. Scre4m is repetitive and boring, again offering nothing new to the table or even trying to do anything new but instead just redoing and copying things done before.
And then there is the Emotional Endings and damage done to Sidney in the films. Scre4m doesn’t have that ending. Allow me to explain what I mean by this….
"You're about to get raped Bitch and I'm talking about my Knife in your guts, ripping your insides open and spilling your guts out. No, seriously, turn around so I can stab ya skinny ass."
In Scream Sidney lost her virginity to the her boyfriend Billy Loomis who turned out to be her Mother’s rapist and killer along with Stu – the second killer and friend. Only did Billy and Stu kill Sidney’ mom, they set Cotton up and sent him to jail and go away with it all for over a year before deciding to do the whole Ghostface killing which resulted in some people getting killed including Sidney’s best friend and Dewey’s sister Tatum. Now that’ll leave scars forever.
Then in Scream 2, Sidney discovers the Killer is Billy’s Mother who wants revenge against Sidney for killing her son, with the other killer been Mickey, a friend to Sidney at her high school. In this sequel not only did Sidney suffer the loss of her friend Randy from the previous film but also the loss of her new best friend Hallie and good boyfriend Derek. (Note – in the original Scream 2 ending before it was leaked, original killers were Hallie, Derek and Mrs. Loomis and ended with everyone dead and Cotton trying to get revenge at the end against Sidney and both of them killing themselves off. WHAT A ENDING RIGHT? Thank God that Script leaked.)
So again, two times Sidney has suffered an emotionally by what the Killers did throughout their little games in the films. Scream 3 had the biggest emotional impact because the original killer, the one who started it all and drove Billy and Stu to kill Sidney’s Mother and cause all the events that have occurred in the two previous films was Roman who turned out to be Sidney’s half brother wanting revenge against her and her Mother who didn’t want anything to do with him.
"Come out, come out...Heressssssssssssssssssss SIDNEY!!!"
Again, another emotional impact for Sidney. Sure Scream 3’s twist comes out of nowhere but it is still a twist and a twist that has a huge impact on Sidney and a twist that pretty much set up everything that ever happened in Scream 1 and 2. But Scre4m yet again fails to accomplish any of the points that the previous films made. THERE IS NO GODDAMN (Sorry Lord) EMOTIONAL IMPACT FOR SIDNEY. And this leads me to who the Killers of the new generation are.
Now before I reveal the grand ending, I just want to say that I knew who the killers of the film were or at least suspected of whom it could be. When it was announced who the Actors were and what characters the Actors would be playing I quickly concluded who the Killer was and came up with the most obvious motive behind what the Killer wanted and I hoped beyond hope that I was wrong. That it was too obvious. That this was Scream and it relied on unexpected twists to deliver the goods. That Wes Craver wouldn’t go for the most obvious choice of Killer. Well he did.
The MAIN KILLER in Scre4m IS JILL, Sidney’s Cousin. And the Second Killer, well like I said, three movie buff geeks? It’s pretty obvious it’s not Kirby, so one of the guys. Who? Well Charlie. Those are the Killers and the motive behind it all? Jill wanted to be like Sidney. She wanted the same fame and fortune Sidney had gotten over her ordeal. And Charlie was the big loser who Jill betrays and stabs to death at the end. For a film that was meant to follow or be remade in the path of the original Scream, Charlie should’ve realized that like the other killers before him, he’d get betrayed by Jill but this isn’t my problem with it. No, my problem is at the fact at how obvious it was that Jill and even Charlie don he comes off as been the only surprising one. But Jill?
"LET ME IN OR I'M GONNA BUTCHER YOU BOTH!!!"
During the entire film, obvious hints and nods are made to Jill been the Killer. From the scenes when she leaves and disappears for half the time before returning to the simple fact she is Sidney’s Cousin who has never been mentioned until now Jill is hands down the worst Killer in the series and the most unbelievable at that.
She is shorter than Sidney but manages to kick her ass and presumably killed the other characters when she wasn’t in the killing scenes and appears to be some kind of mini-hulk because this spoiled bitch manages to inflict numerous amounts of pain on herself just so she can make it look like she was attacked and hurt but instead of making it come off as disturbing, the whole scene where she stabs herself or tears her hair out or drops onto glass is pure bloody comedy.
"That's my boyfriend Bitches. He stabs for a living."
And her motive for simply being because she wanted to be famous and get noticed because of this day’s and age of the media was just…OLD. It was nothing new. Other films have had this same motive before. It is nothing new and if it was simply for revenge, OH WAIT, that’s also it because Jill never knew Sidney because Sidney forgot about them. Way to write off the reason for Jill and her Mom for never having been mentioned in the sequels.
The reveal of the Killer and Motives behind it all was TOO OBVIOUS and that was the most disappointing part of the whole film for me. I sat and watched hoping this was not the case and even at that point the film managed to disappoint me. And again there was no emotion impact done on Sidney.
She hardly knew Jill and none of her friends got killed. In the end Sidney is bloody super girl and comes off all strong and uncaring like nothing surprises her anymore which again leads me to my previous idea that they should’ve made Gale the Killer. Motive would’ve been the same but having Gale as the Killer would’ve added that must needed emotional depth and impact while also having Sidney die in the end and perhaps having Dewey been the hero by killing Gale off and been the only one left.
"Now would be a good time to question my sexuality."
People will be saying that then there can be no Scream 5 but think about it? Where can Scream 5 go? Unless Jill is alive or they do some over the top twist with Jill’s Dad coming out of nowhere to get revenge for Sidney killing his daughter, a la Scream 2 – Mrs. Loomis, which would be stupid to do because they’re just reusing the same formula over again then having Scre4m go all the way by making one of the trio the villains and killing them off would’ve been perfect to finally close the door to the Scream Franchise and conclude it in a unexpected yet grand and sadly fashion.
But instead the film is a cliché of everything the original was against and Scre4m becomes a parody of itself with more laughs instead of scares and pretty much ignoring character development for the sake of seeing a bunch of random people we haven’t had time to come attached to and watching them all die and that is really upsetting to me and a waste of mine time because Scream was never like that. It was original and did something not a lot of horror films managed to achieve in its time and now in this day and age full of internet information, torture porn, and hyped up media, Scre4m became that very thing Scream took a piss at all those years ago.
10 Years Later and this…this is the cheapfest they could come up with? Everything Scream 1, 2 and 3 were…this doesn’t even compare to them. And if people come and say New Decade and New Rules then I’m sorry, I can’t agree because Scream retained the same old rules that every horror film of its time was using. All Scream did was make people self-aware of those Rules that no one at that time really realized existed. Scre4m on the other hand doesn’t nothing new, both in terms of been in a new decade or the so-called new rules. What were those again? So much potiential and it was all thrown out the window.
"I guess you haven't heard...but I'm the Sheriff around these parts. So put your hands up"
Well, at least Sidney was right about one thing. “DON’T FUCK WITH THE ORIGINAL”. That itself is pretty much a message to the movie. The Originals will always be better no matter what new crap comes out and sadly to say, Scre4m is one of those pieces of crap that should never have been made in the first place and I hope a Scream 5 and 6 aren’t made because this film has managed to damage everything that made the Originals masterpieces in their own right. Nothing is taken serious in this film.
There is part where Sidney FIGHTS AND KICKS THE KILLER to the ground. Sidney turns around to come face to face with the Cops and turns back to see the Killer gone all in the space of about 2 seconds. And then there is another moment where Dewey has the chance to kill him but instead misses his shots. HE’S A POLICE OFFICER WHO ALSO HAPPENED TO SHOOT THE KILLER IN SCREAM 3 MULTIPLE TIME BEFORE SHOOTING HIM POINT ON IN THE HEAD AND HERE HE CAN’T SHOOT THE GUY STRAIGHT ON THIS TIME? WHAT?????????????
Scre4m is nothing but a parody of Scream and a Comedy. Nothing more, nothing less.
I will give out different scores for this film.
As a Comedy Film – 7/10. This film will make you laugh. I’ll give it that.
As a Overall Film – 6/10.
As a SCREAM film – 5/10. If not for just seeing old faces, this film is nothing but disappointment from beginning to end. Everything that made Scream good is gone. Even Wes Craver’s style of directing is lost.
I will give it ONE GOOD Note – Roger L. Jackson is still awesome as ever as the Voice of Ghostface and I loved how sick and even more twisted he came off in this film. That is all.
"Hello, my name is Roger L. Jackson and I'm obviously not a fat, nerdy, obsessed, stalker, pedo, type, ass with a awesome, scary, badass voice that people will remember forever."
