Some people like to guess the way a movie is going to end, unraveling the mystery and naming the killer before the characters do. It can be a fun way of engaging with a movie.
But sometimes, don’t you kind of hate the guy that tells you what’s going to happen next?
“Scream” is a movie that has it both ways.
I remember how immensely popular the movie was (although I must’ve been a few years removed because the movie came out in 1996 when I was only 6, and that’s very young). It was scary, shockingly gory, clever, self-aware and featured a simple, creepy and iconic villain that instantly became a Halloween costume staple.
Today, my generation remembers “Scream” as a sort of cult relic from the ’90s (“Why are you carrying a cellular phone, son?”), embodying all the best things about modern horror movies while providing a much needed throwback to ’70s and ’80s horror classics that arguably hold up better for horror fans than the torture porn films released today. All the while, it stays one step ahead of the audience and seems to be winking back at us every step of the way.
But “Scream” is winking so much it looks like it has an eye twitch. The famous “Do you know the rules” scene in which Jamie Kennedy explains the dos and don’ts of staying alive in a horror movie to me feels very forced. It’s Wes Craven’s act of showing his own hand, toying with our expectations such that he can yet another twist at the end.
Obviously this is all cheeky and self-referential, but by this point we get the joke. To be standing in a video store (what’s that?!) and claiming that “It’s all one great big movie” sounds like Craven screaming, “Look at how self-aware we are!”
The fact that it’s meta and self-aware shows why “Scream” has aged well in the 21st Century, because although it is very knowledgeable of horror movie cliches and formulas, “Scream” is not precisely a movie for horror movie buffs but for people who are simply familiar with the genre.
But beyond that, there are some stylish and suspenseful murder sequences that hold up un-ironically, most notably the opening scene with Drew Barrymore. It’s a good reminder that a horror movie can have a sense of humor and self-awareness, but it must be genuinely scary first.