Scre4m

Scream. Nearly my earliest sojourn into the illegal realms of 18 certificate movies and one of my favourites for a long time. It’s witty, relevant and scary (at least when you’re scared of what’s under your bed/you don’t know who the killer(s) is) it’s even educational in its charmingly self-aware way. The characters are interesting, likable and believable, if a little similar to ones from a popular sitcom. The other two parts of the original trilogy (one can only assume a modern trilogy is on the way) had a lot going for them too despite the fact that the conclusion to 3 was a little contrived and didn’t give you enough reason to care.

     But anyway. Witty, relevant and scary; “Scre4m”, as it likes to be called, is perhaps one of those things if you count it as being half of each of the first two.

     I can’t help but liken it to a dinner party, you and your significant other have invited an old friend from high school round because he was in town and you remember he was a really funny guy back in the day (before he disappeared from your lives to go live with wolves or something). You open the door he hands your wife a bottle of self referential wine and cracks an in-joke with you, you laugh he laughs your wife laughs, as you move into the hall he pet’s your dog calling it by name. You arrive in the lounge where he promptly takes out a broken piece of glass and slashes his wrists crying “you did this – YOU!”.  Then you wake up.

       You open the door; he hands your wife some familiar-looking flowers you get an old joke, you, wife, guest, dog all laugh and then he calls in an air-strike levelling your neighbourhood. Then you wake up.

       You walk to the door, not even sure if you want this friend to come round anymore – it’s been a long time and, Christ what do you have to talk about? He was always really into his films right and all you did was read – what if it transpires he voted for the Tories? You open the door he hands your wife a bottle of self referential wine and cracks an in-joke with you, you laugh he laughs your wife laughs, as you move into the hall he pet’s your dog calling it by name. You arrive in the lounge where he... ungh.

       Back to the movie and after the opening false starts and then start, it starts to get bad. The three pillars of Scream – Sidney, Dewey and Monica – have all changed somewhat. They’re not just older and out-of-shape (I don’t mean fat, in Sidney’s case she’s taller and more skeletal and alien looking) but they have less substance and allure than two mini digestives lying on top of each other pretending to be an Oreo. Which I concede must have been the intention as there is a full packet of Oreos in most of the new cast, the new high-school kids. I can’t help but feel they should have just done away with the old three (or at least Dewey and Monica) as they do very little until the end and for most of it just get in the way, like people a head of you in line for the ATM. Perhaps a full reboot, like they do with every second series of Skins. Still the pretty new cast drag you through the first hour or so.

     And I do mean drag. Through broken glass and salt.

     Going back to our suburban dinner party and this time assuming the role of the charismatic guest; after moving to the table the subject of the good old days has been brought up and your laughing and joking about some old teacher and some good feeling has started to stir. Like that rumbling in your guts juts before you let out a wet fart. Everyone pretends not to notice now everyone is smiling as they try not to hurl. You shift your weight around and. Fuck. You’ve followed through a bit, you realise as your ass cheeks slip and slide as they come together. You march on as you tell some of Ye Olde Jokes but the stench doesn’t go away. Your new jokes aren’t flying either as your confidence is all shot up and your aware that this isn’t the first time this has happened – even though you were drunk most other times you can’t help but wonder if this is the thin edge of full faecal incontinence.  

     It’s not a good hour.

     One of the things I really liked about Scream was the way it embraced new technology, mobile phones (which I’m aware were widely available in America since 1902 but when I first watched Scream the concept was as good as science fiction). Before mobiles if you got a death threat via the phone you were safe in the knowledge that the person threatening you was as immobile as you were and that you were probably a car journey away. But Scream brought us the possibility that you were getting a death threat from your porch. Or wardrobe. Or under your bed. So I expected FaceBook and twitter and things to play a bigger role, instead they made cameo appearances and the notion of how much we live and breathe social networking et al was only nudged in our direction, like some leftovers we may want but could always be given to the dog.

     And as we enter the third act of the movie and the third act of this review lets return once more to the dinner party metaphor I’m enjoying entirely too much. We’ll assume the position of the wife, for the sake of symmetry.

     Your guest get’s up slightly shiftily and red faced, explaining he needs the loo and inquires its location.  You tell him and as he shambles towards the door you look at your husband with a raised eyebrow and slight frown. Five to seven minutes later your guest returns, fresher that he’s been since he got in. As he sits down a new passion has returned to the conversation as he tells you about his ability to juggle Molotov cocktails. Naturally your husband issues a challenge and before you know it your favourite piece of imitation art is in cinders the walls are bleeding and Fido is meowing in the corner. Then you wake up.

      I didn’t hate this movie. My main obstruction to loving it though was the ‘main’ characters – but I was conflicted; I didn’t want the ghost to kill them I just didn’t want them there. The fact that it was so relentlessly self-aware and self-conscious was a huge problem too – it seemed like every conversation was about slasher movies and characters were aware that they were going to be murdered as opposed to meagrely entertaining the idea.

     The thing that really annoys me about it is it seems to have this internal debate with itself; it can’t decide if it’s perpetuating serial killer violence (it’s not) or if cinema violence is just harmless fun (it is). Fair play raising the pointless discussion but then squirming around about it just gets in the way of all the bloody fun.

     And that’s the thing. The good parts of this movie are fun – it’s entertaining, playing with its audience – which we love really – and surprising us. It’s just a shame that all that good stuff doesn’t really start until it’s almost over.

     Then you wake up.