WARNING!!!
These previews contain vital
plot information and other potentially movie-spoiling stuff!
If you don't want to know, read no further!
SCREAM 2
Written by Kevin Williamson. Directed by Wes Craven. Starring Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, David Arquette, Jamie Kennedy, Jerry O'Connell, Elsie Neal, Laurie Metcalf, Sarah Michelle Gellar... and Jada Pinkett and Omar Epps as our celebrity victims.
Okay, because I know this is a highly anticipated film within the community of horror fans, and to avoid any more stupid, Oliver-Stone-U-TURN nonsense, I'm gonna state this right off - I'm going to tell you who the killer is. Okay? You don't want to know who it is? Stop reading right here. Stop. Halt. Cease to read. Terminate all eye contact with this review. Now.
There. Now if you don't want to know the plot and ending of this script and you're still reading this review, do me a favor. Rather than write me a nasty letter? Write the word 'DUMBASS' on your forehead instead. It's quicker, more to the point, and saves me the effort of having to do it for you.
Now that that's out of the way... Are we all ready? Everyone cozy and ready to hear whether Kevin Williamson was able to catch lightning in a bottle twice? Good. Let's begin. I thought the original SCREAM was a blast. It was scary, it was funny, it was fresh - it was more fun than I had had watching a horror film in a very long time. Wes Craven was back in NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET form and the young cast was surprisingly good, but the star to me was the script. Now, I don't think the script was a perfect piece of writing (I mean, you're being stalked by a killer and you go to a PARTY?), but I thought the angle of having its teen protagonists aware of and commenting on horror movies was a very original and ballsy twist. (Note to myself: Perhaps using the words 'twist' and 'balls' in the same sentence is not such a good idea...) The other great thing about the script - as a fan of fright films - was that the obvious love Williamson has for these scary movies really came through. SCREAM wasn't condescending, and it wasn't sarcastic or ironic. It was sincere in its love for the films it was sending up. And that's why horror film fans have embraced this film so passionately - it feels like it was written by one of their own. A fellow horror fanatic makes good!
Neve Campbell as
Sidney Prescott and Jerry O'Connell as
her new boyfriend Derek. Could she have worse taste in men?
And now we have the inevitable sequel - maybe that's the ultimate horror movie sendup, that SCREAM spawned a sequel almost instantaneously. The plot? Well, in a nutshell... everybody dies. Oh! Sorry. I'm getting ahead of myself. The script opens at a theatre showing a preview of STAB, a movie based on Gale Weathers' book about the Woodsboro murders (in other words, the plot of the first film). A young couple are killed in the theatre during the movie, while hundreds of audience members watch, thinking it's all part of the show. We then cut to Sidney Prescott, the heroine of the first film, who is now in college. News of this latest killing brings the media down on her once more, including Gale Weathers and her new cameraman Randy (the video store clerk from the first film). There's also a new aggressive reporter to contend with by the name of Debbie Salt. She's so obnoxious that even tabloid queen Gale is disgusted with her. Sidney is escorted away from the mob of reporters by Deputy Dewey, who now works as a security guard at the college. We also meet Sid's new boyfriend Derek, a film major (of course), and her roommate Hallie, with whom she's trying to get into one of the schools snottier sororities. And oh yeah, Cotton Weary, the guy who was wrongly convicted for the murder of Sidney's mother shows up, and he's pissed at having had to spend a year in jail because of Sid's testimony. Okay, have I mentioned everyone important? I think so. Good. Well, needless to say, Sidney starts to receive threatening phone calls from the killer, just like the first film. And also needless to say, the killer comes after her, managing to slaughter most everyone else on the campus that she comes into contact with. So who dies? Well let's see... Randy... Deputy Dewey... Gale... Derek... Hallie... Debbie Salt... and possibly Cotton and Sidney.
Why do I say 'possibly'? Because the draft of the script I have is not complete. Williamson has everything tacked onto the last page describing the ending, but it's not scripted. So how does it end? I'm not 100% sure. But I'll tell ya the basics. Who're the bad guys (of course there's more than one - it's the sequel to SCREAM!)? Derek and Hallie have teamed up to kill Sidney for some cockeyed reason involving movies and the internet and wanting to be famous. They're helped by Debbie Salt, who isn't actually a reporter but is Mrs. Loomis - mother of Billy Loomis, one of the killers in the first film. See, she's a little pissed at the Prescott family, and wouldn't mind seeing Sidney rubbed out. Kind of a tit-for-tat deal. They've also kidnapped Cotton Weary, who takes the position of Sidney's father from the first film... in other words he's tied up during the big final confrontation, which takes place onstage at the college theatre. During this confrontation, Debbie Salt kills both Derek and Hallie, and then is killed by Cotton, who manages to free himself. Everything's solved, right? Wrong. Now Cotton wants to kill Sidney. He chases her around the theatre and... this is where the script I have peters out. Williamson describes Sid and Cotton's 'fight to the finish', each of them stabbing the other repeatedly until they both collapse. They lay onstage, unable to move, their eyes slowly closing. He then has typed 'THE END (for now)'.
Heather Graham as the
movie-within-a-movie's version
of Drew Barrymore. You'd think this stuff could've been funnier.
Those are some of the basics. But this film - like the first - is not going to live or die by its plot. It's going to live or die by how fun it is. And I'm sorry to say that I didn't think this script was very fun at all. To begin... SCREAM's angle of having all the characters aware of horror films is pretty much gone here. Instead Williamson has tried to insert a certain jokiness about movies in general. The film of STAB is like a bad version of SCREAM, Derek and Hallie are film majors (we should know Hallie's evil because at one point she defends RETURN OF THE JEDI and the Ewoks - always the sign of a demented mind), and once again the killers are motivated by films they've seen, though in this case it's NATURAL BORN KILLERS and DEAD MAN WALKING. One of the problems with this angle is that, while it's different from the first film, it only serves to dilute the focus. SCREAM had fun with a very specific genre that contained very specific rules. SCREAM 2 tries to make comments on all types of films, and it just isn't as cohesive. The most consistent filmic in-joke is various characters' assertions throughout that sequels are inferior to the original film. Irony rears its ugly head.
The other disappointing thing about the script was that it simply wasn't all that scary. It really did read like Williamson was going through the motions here. There are creepy phone calls in the first film? Okay, here are some significantly less creepy calls in this one. Gale gets slugged by Sidney in the first film? We'll have Gale be the one to slug an obnoxious reporter here. Sid's dad was tied up during the final confrontation in SCREAM? Cotton'll be tied up during the final confrontation here. Billy and Stu stabbed each other repeatedly at the end of the first film? Sid and Cotton'll stab each other repeatedly at the end of this one. And on and on. It's weird to read, because Williamson rags on sequels, and even uses the scenes from STAB to make fun of poorly written horror films... but SCREAM 2 reads like one of those films! Williamson even goes so far as to include this note at one point: '(NOTE: WES DOES REALLY SCARY SHIT HERE.)' Now, that's a funny aside - if the script is scary. But with this script it actually seems more like a plea for help. I've heard unsubstantiated rumors that Williamson wrote the screenplay in three days. Sadly, I can believe it. It's sloppy and uninspired. From the several dozen typos and misspellings, to the fact that the ending is described but not scripted (the description beginning with the words 'AND THAT'S AS FAR AS I'VE GOTTEN', seeming to indicate a missed deadline), the whole thing reeks like a quickie that was pumped out on a too-tight deadline just to get the sequel into production.
So who's behind the
ghostface mask this time?
I mean besides every third kid at your door this Halloween...
You know, I was really looking forward to this script. I'd read the SCARY MOVIE screenplay (SCREAM's original title) and found it to be just as much fun as the final film. So I had high hopes for the sequel. I was hoping that Williamson would take the cheeky sense of humor he displayed in the first movie and build on it. When initial reports indicated that Tori Spelling would play the part of Sidney in the film-within-a-film (playing off a line in the original) it sounded like things were right on track. But not if the script I read is any indication. The only clever thing about the movie-within-a-movie stuff is the casting. SCREAM was an intelligent horror film that I had hoped would actually spawn an intelligent string of sequels. Oh well. Guess not. They had better hope WES DOES REALLY SCARY SHIT HERE, because the script is a complete wash-out. The tag-line on the poster reads 'SOMEONE'S TAKEN THEIR LOVE OF SEQUELS ONE STEP TOO FAR'... actually, I don't think they've taken it nearly far enough.
MY PROGNOSIS? I think we're dealing with typical sequel logic here - it should make about 50 to 75% of what the original made. That would still make SCREAM 2 a pretty sizeable hit, but I can't imagine it's going to garner the same passionate following that the original managed to attract.
JUST FOR THE RECORD...
... I've been informed that the draft of the script reviewed above has undergone major changes both before and during shooting. I hope so. Apparently Williamson suffered from Shane Black disease and decided to kill off his most popular characters in the sequel, but has since come to his senses (Shane reportedly killed off Mel Gibson's character in the first LETHAL WEAPON sequel... which is why he was, uh, rewritten). So with any luck they've added some wit, a few more surprises, and more scares. Like I said, I like horror films, and I enjoyed the original. I'm rooting for it. See? I'm not such a hardass.
AND THE CRITICS SAY...
CRITIC'S CHOICE: "I don't know why but slasher films inspire me to get right to the point. So here it is: SCREAM 2 is as good as its predecessor. It's every bit as frightening, every bit as funny, and every bit as nineties... As in the first SCREAM, screenwriter Kevin Williamson builds his script around media references. (One early scene takes place in a cinema class where the students talk about how sequels suck.) This time, Williamson not only plays with the audience's expectations derived from a history of horror films, but also has expectations from his own original SCREAM to bend, subvert and satisfy. And he continues to delight in letting you know that no matter how smart you think you are, he's always one step ahead of you."
LA TIMES: "You can't blame the makers of last year's terrific sleeper horror picture SCREAM for trying to cash in on its runaway success. Yet in striving mightily not merely to duplicate its impact but improve upon it, director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson have raised the ante to the degree that contrivance and a horrendous body count combine to yield a morbid effect for discriminating filmgoers, despite a comic tone. Still, there's enough ingenuity and scariness to please plenty of fans of the first film... As before, the movie is loaded with film references, and Williamson not only raises the old question of the relationship of screen violence and real-life violence, but also jokes about whether sequels can ever be as successful as the originals. As clever, witty and adroit as the filmmakers are in covering their bases they cannot dispel the feeling that their sequel is not as good as their original, even though it abounds in confident stylistic and technical flourishes that are the result of Craven's long experience as a horrormeister."
ROGER EBERT: "Like all sequels, this one is a transparent attempt to cash in on the original - but, of course, it knows it is, and contains its own learned discussion of sequels. The verdict is that only a few sequels have been as good as the originals; the characters especially like ALIENS and THE GODFATHER, PART II. As for SCREAM 2, it's... well, it's about as good as the original... Both movies use a Boo Machine, a plot device for making the audience jump and scream and clutch each others' forearms... I was not frightened by the Boo Moments in SCREAM 2, and I found the violence kind of inappropriate; this movie is gorier than the original, and that distracts from the witty screenplay by Kevin Williamson... His premise this time is that violence is quickly translated into marketable form by the media; since he is doing that very thing in SCREAM 2, there are ironies within ironies here. The movie is so articulate about what it's doing, indeed, that you can't criticize it on those grounds - it gets there first... The Williamson screenplay uses the horror platform as a launching pad for a lot of zingers; I'd like to see his work in a more mainstream film."
AND JUST A NOTE FROM ME: Agree or disagree with these reviews, there's one thing about them that I thought was pretty cool. All three complimented the writer of the screenplay, crediting him for the clever touches within the film. This NEVER happens! For that alone let's all give Kevin Williamson a pat on the back - he actually made these idiots realize that films are not only directed, they're written, too. (Of course, Ebert's condescending little remark about Williamson being good enough to work in "more mainstream films" was a snide shot at the genre, I thought. Oh well, horror and comedy will always be forced to sit at the kiddies' table I guess. Which is ironic, because every time I had to sit at the kiddies' table, horror and comedy always followed.)
WHILE THE PUBLIC SAYS...
SCREAM 2 enjoyed the biggest December opening weekend ever, slashing past the competition and scaring up (See? I could write for Variety!) $39.2 million.
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