scream movie review

Scream movie review

I will be reviewing the seminal horror film scream released in 1996 by Freddy Kruger creator Wes Craven who also directed the three scream sequels before passing away in 2015. It’s hard to overstate the impact scream had on the horror genre. It reignited slasher flicks, spawning a whole host of late 90’s imitators and set the tone for the genre for the best part of the decade. After scream, horror would take on a certain feel- it’d be funny, hip and most importantly, self-aware. Scream told the audience that the characters they were watching were just like them- they knew about Jason, Freddy and chucky, they knew the so called rules of the genre. Then scream told them, that knowledge wouldn’t save these characters- they were going to die anyways. 

The movie begins with a phone ringing and we are introduced to Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore) when she answers she is greeted with a voice of an inquisitive stranger. Thinking it’s a Wrong number, she hangs up only to have him ring back. They Eventually start talking about horror films and this is where we get the classic line “what’s your favorite scary movie”. Eventually Casey gets creeped out and the inquisitive Stanger from before goes from friendly to terrifying. He tells her, her boyfriend is tied up on the patio and to keep him alive she must answer horror movie trivia questions. Casey messes up the question about who the killer was in the original Friday the 13^thmovie and as punishment she turns on the patio light to see her boyfriend Steve had been gutted, his intestines dangling in the wind as he dies. What follows is a well-crafted cat and mouse chase sequence. Casey runs for safety when she sees her parents heading back but does not make it in time and ghostface stabs he in the chest and chocking her to the ground. Her parents listening to her dying breaths as she is dragged away. They ultimately find her body hung from a tree. Audiences were shocked that Drew Barrymore was killed right off the bat, and that’s what makes this entire opening sequence an instant classic.

After the classic opening sequence, we meet our final girl Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) who appears in all three sequels to this cult classic and boyfriend Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) before they head to school and we get this movie’s cast which includes Tatum (Rose McGowan- Charmed), reporter Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox-Friends) who is reporting on last night’s murder and towns officer Dewey who is Tatum’s step brother (David Arquette) who wants to interview Sidney  but they are sympathetic towards her since her mother was killed a year before. They treat the murders with about as much respect as high schoolers treat anything. We also meet two new characters Stu (Mathew lillard) and Randy (Jamie Kennedy). Cuts to Sidney in her house after a nap and the movie just goes for it by having ghostface attack Sidney in her own home. She runs upstairs in a horror movie cliché and locks herself in a room to call the police and ghostface disappears which he seems to do a lot in this movie. Moments later the movie starts to make people suspects by having Sidney’s boyfriend show up with a phone just after the killer disappears. After a few more deaths including the principal and Tatum who has one of the most memorable and creative deaths in the movie. She tries to crawl through a doggy door when she’s facing the killer she gets stuck and has her back snapped as the garage door rises up.

Scream has one of the most memorable twist endings in a horror film where we find out Billy who was previously stabbed and presumed dead turned out to be alive and working with Stu who revealed it was also them that killed Sidney’s mam a year ago and they are going to blame Sidney’s dada for all the murders since he has been missing for the entirety of the film. The movie ends with gale shooting Billy and Sidney dropping a TV on Stu’s head and Sidney shooting Billy again as he comes back for one final scare.

This movie is a cult classic for fans of the horror genre and is known as one of the greatest horror films of all time. When it was first released in 1996 it was critically acclaimed by fan and reviewers and still hold up today even if the sequel weren’t as good as the original