Scream 4

CAUTION! SPOILERS APLENTY!

The fourth film in the franchise seemed determined to do a couple of things simultaneously, the first was to atone for the rather poor near-spoofy third film, the second was to somehow act as both a sequel and a reboot of the franchise. Generally I thought the film was pretty so-so, it had its moments, but then all the Scream films do despite their overall success. But not one Scream has managed to match that balance of thrills, jump-moments and smart comedy that made the first film such a breakout hit.

With the opening scene in this four-quel Kevin Williamson and Wes Craven delivered a double-whammy of movies-within-movies that rather brilliantly played upon audience expectations for how a Scream film should begin.

Beyond that it was pretty much business as usual, with Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) returning to her hometown, where it all began 15 years ago, to publicize a motivational book about confronting and dealing with fear. Meanwhile there's Sheriff Dewey (David Arquette) still amiably goofing about, having a somewhat frayed marriage with former reporter Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox), and a whole heap of new teen characters and disposable others to be despatched or suspected once the screams start.

The first big problem with the film almost didn't exist, in fact, it was nearly the first thing about the film that really made me sit up in my seat and root for it, and it happens the first time Sidney and Ghostface meet.



It's the usual running around the house routine, but this time Sidney doesn't run, she squares straight up to Ghostface and gives 'him' a hefty kicking, and this new character beat was perfect and exciting. At long last here would be a scream-queen who wouldn't turn tail shrieking when the masked murderer enters the building, sure she's not going to dumbly stroll into an impossible situation, but she's not going to chicken out. This would mean the filmmakers would have to be even more inventive with how the killer gets under Sidney's skin and...

Oh no, they changed their minds, and Sidney becomes her usual self in next to no time.

It made me think about Steve Miner's rather good sequel Halloween: H20, where after all the generally teen-based slash-em-up fair has gone on for long enough, Jamie Lee Curtis' long suffering Laurie Strode decides to face her brother alone, she grabs an axe from a nearby fire safety point and strolls across the deserted schoolyard to where she believes her brother will be waiting, and that spine-tingling John Carpenter theme music kicks in. It's a brilliant moment, it doesn't turn Strode into some sort of 'Stallone-like' superhero, it just reinforces the point that she's been running away for so long and it's time to stop running and finish this.



Just a shame that they ended up brining her back for some more terrible sequels after that. Tsk!

Anyway, firstly, Williamson and Craven needed to maintain the strength of Sidney's character, I mean, she'd come to town to promote a book about facing your fears, and she does very little of that in the film. In fact, by the end scene where the killers are revealed she's pretty much going through exactly the same routine as she did at the end of the first film. Perhaps a deliberate 'remake' nod on the part of the creative team, but not really effective with regards to the overall structure of the franchise, it's a moment that seems lazy, her reaction there more to allow the villain to monologue for a bit.

So, the next biggest problem with the film's script was the ending, and that really matters in a slasher movie like this because essentially, moreso than a horror film, the Scream movies are 'whodunnit' mysteries, the scenes where people are being killed are pretty much totally interchangeable unless it's Dewey/Gale/Sydney being pursued, though it's also a huge shame that the filmmakers didn't have the guts to kill off any of their Holy Trinity.

In the end the film's message is 'originals are better than the remakes', the mastermind behind the killings was Sidney's cousin Jill (Emma Roberts) who wants to be famous - like Sidney - for surviving all the horrible killings, whilst framing her ex-boyfriend Trevor for it all. She stabs Sidney in the stomach, proceeds to mutilate herself and wakes up in hospital with all the press fawning over her miraculous escape.



Now, this is, to some degree, almost a great ending if the following ten minutes didn't happen in which Jill finds out Sidney survived the stabbing, she then goes to Sidney's hospital room to finish her off, only to have the Dewey/Gale cavalry show up, and Sidney finally kills Jill, quipping; "Never fuck with the original."

Sigh.

I kind of liked the ending - ignoring Sidney's whimpering - up to the point where Jill wakes up in the hospital and discovers Sidney survived, and I would have been happier and more impressed by the filmmakers if it had gone either of two ways:

1. Police turn up to the house, paramedics come in and find the bodies, Sidney is pronounced dead in front of Dewey and Gale, who embrace. A paramedic looks up from Jill's body and calls out that she's still breathing. Gale and Dewey accompany her on a stretcher as she's being taken to an ambulance. Dewey says some comforting and goofy things to her, which Jill nods wearily at. Gale, rather opportunistically, asks Jill to promise that she'll give her first interview to her, Jill feebly agrees. She is loaded into the back of the ambulance and just as the doors close she lets a happy little grin escape onto her evil face. The end.

2. The ending is exactly the same as it is, even including Jill waking up in the hospital with Dewey next to her bed. However, he is upset because Sidney died, he tells Jill this, expresses some confusion over the case, his tone is peculiar, a little detached, Jill plays it all angelic and innocent, but she can't help feeling a little confused. Dewey gets up to go, he stops at the door and looks back at Jill half over his shoulder, says; "Y'know, there are certain rules in order to survive a scary movie..." He lets out a little sniff of a laugh before turning on the television set and walking out. Jill sits in the bed, looking towards where Dewey left, but the words from the television enter her consciousness; "Viewers may want to look away, as this footage is quite disturbing." The sounds from the television are replaced with the sounds of the scene in which Jill is smashing herself into furniture around the house in order to get away with murder. Jill's eyes grow wide and worried as she watches, realising that the footage she is watching came from the geeky teen Robbie's headset camera and these images were broadcast live across the internet. Jill moves to leave the bed, but realises she's handcuffed to the frame. The end.

I think Ending #1 would have really pissed off a lot of people, I do love an unhappy horror ending, but I think Ending #2 would have been absolutely brilliant and would have forgiven the film for a number of its lazier earlier scenes. It would have closed the book on Sidney's story once and for all in a unique and dramatically surprising fashion, and I think it would have given the audience a satisfying feeling as they left the cinema. I know people 'want' to see the baddie get killed in an exciting way, but the scene in which Jill attacked Sidney in her hospital room was ridiculous, not least because it completely destroyed Jill's defense.