Scre4m (or Scream 4, if you couldn't decode the title) is a bit like recent TV show The Kennedys in quite a few ways. Nobody really asked for it, the story had been told repeatedly, and (personally) I felt obligated to watch it for some reason.
Probably due to the original Scream. Now 15 years old it is undoubtedly a classic and did rewrite the rules of a slasher movie. In the long run, it wasn't great as it spawned 'I Know What You Did Last Summer' and their ilk
Scream 2 wasn't up there with the original, and Scream 3 was just worthless, in fact the only highlight of that film was a cameo by Jay & Silent Bob.
So here we are. 11 years after the original, with the surviving cast trio of Neve Campbell, David Arquette and Courtney Cox-Arquette (who now looks like she could fashion her own line of wallets from her skin) and also with Kevin Williamson (who sat the third film out) and horror maestro Wes Craven.
The premise this time is weak to say the least. It's another Woodsboro anniversary, and Sidney Prescott unfortunately picks that time to return to town to promote her new book. As this happens some new young whippersnappers start to get picked off by Ghostface (after a hugely pointless opening salvo of 'Stab' openings, one featuring Anna Paquin and Kristen Bell), and its up to the new bunch of kids (including Emma Roberts and Hayden Panettiere) and the old guard to stop whoever is behind the mask this time.
It's a bit of a problem with the whole "Who is behind the mask?" question. It has gotten to the point in Scream films where they put so much weight on that one thing, that you are wondering if every character that appears on screen is the killer (and the only way you can put your mind to rest is if you see Ghostface kill them and even then you feel like it's no guarantee.
The new young cast are pretty punchable too, with the exception of Panettiere's Jill who is actually a pretty likable character as these things go. As for the the older cast, they are still pretty annoying, just older. In fact the younger cast seem so much younger than Campbell and the Arquettes did in the original, you have to wonder if Craven plans to do a 5th film in a kindergarten. Or inside a mother expecting twins perhaps. 2 babys, 1 killer, 1 stomach.
But the film isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. It's a teen slasher that gives us a character you don't want eviscerated 30 seconds after meeting them, the deaths are pretty gruesome, incredibly so if you consider it's a 15 (and now, I think it's about time they released the original Scream uncut over here, considering that's an 18) and there's even the odd flash of creativity and humour in the writing. You do have to look hard for that though. The pace is quite good in the last 25 minutes or so too.
But sadly, the film itself is all over the place. Smart arsey one minute, totally incompetent the next. You have one moment you really dig, the next it's shat all over by some mirthless one liner ("Fuck Bruce Willis"), it's actually frustrating. You start to sense that the time when you saw Williamson and Craven do good films has passed, and in the case of the latter that is a hell of a shame.
**
A film that shows the occasional glimmer of what made the first two Scream films so good, possibly not as bad as Scream 3, but I try to blank that film out. But overall just a bit of a pointless shambles.
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