Movie 10: Scream 2

Maybe is a rare example of more substance than original?

Cast: Neve Campbell, David Arquette, Courtney Cox, Jamie Kennedy, Timothy Olyphant, Elise Neal, Jerry O'Connell, Liev Schrieber, Laurie Metcalf.

Director: Wes Craven

Very few films have a tendency to discuss race in any way that actually matters.  This one actually does, which is relevant at the start of this blog because I was just discussing that very idea just a few days ago when I was talking to a friend about "The People Under The Stairs" which has a hero who is a person-of-color who survives through the film.  

The opening of this film actually makes good, albeit it basic, points about the admittedly White nature of the horror film.  "The horror film is notorious for ignoring the African-American element!" Jada Pinkett exclaims.  She isn't wrong.  But it's interesting that this film opens with such a discussion because it has one of the more believable and intelligent black characters in Gales new cameraman.  There will be more on that, later.

For now, let's talk about the expert self-parody that occurs right out of the gate.  "Stab" is clearly a terrible film, and that is pretty genius.  While the choice to attempt considerable tension in a room that is positively filled with people.  Why is the lobby filled with people when the movie is running?  I've never seen fans of a film running around while the film is actually going on in the theater.  But, hey, horror movies aren't called documentaries so I should stop being silly.

Y'know, we don't spend a lot of time with them, but I rather like Omar Epps and Jada Pinkett.  They're kinda sweet.  Especially when he actual relents and says "Okay, let's go see Sandra Bullock."  It just seems like something a nice boyfriend would actually do...and boyfriends in horror films are almost always dicks.  Omar Epps has a weird death scene, though.  It almost makes more sense in "Scary Movie" when the Wayans Brother who is playing a gay man sticks his ear up to the wall of the bathroom stall.  I've been in a lot of public bathrooms and rarely want to even touch myself because everything is filthy.  But he hears giggling and wants to...put his ear up to the wall?  Again, maybe I'm being silly again.

If I were Jada, I woulda gone for the mask when he came back covered in blood.  At least, I think so.

Jada has a very clever death scene, though, especially after talking about "black guy dies first" earlier on.  But the death overall is just a solid one.  The fact that everyone thinks that it's a publicity stunt or people just getting into it...it's a pretty chilling scene.  Plus, she dies on stage.  How overtly Meta is that?  Like the "Halloween" closet scene playing in the background of the original, it doesn't call a lot of attention to itself.  It's just clever without bashing you over the head with it.

Hollywood dorm rooms are always hilarious.  They have king-sized beds in them!  I spent one semester in a dorm room with three other guys, and we all had tiny little twin beds separated by two feet of space.

The film theory class is a fun scene despite some cringe-worthy dialogue.  There's a lot of "Like, uh, hello" going on...people ending their sentences with question marks.  Uh, like, hello that is SOOO 1992?!  The sequel discussion isn't a bad one...I do believe that only "Godfather Part 2" is the only sequel I can think of that's better then the original...except maybe "Scream 2?"  Maybe?  Already more substance and better deconstruction happening.  From the discussion on sequels to Gale getting a taste of her own medicine...strong meta-stuff.  

Rebecca Gayheart and Portia De Rossi!  I love De Rossi.  Especially in "Better Off Ted."  I should watch that again.  So should you.

I feel like Neve Campbell brings a little more to herself in the second outing.  She's a little shinier, but still a bit bland.  I never thought Sydney was the strong point of this franchise, which might seem a little dickish but...there it is.  As odd as it is, I think Duey and Gale bring more to the franchise overall.  I do like that Cotton is kinda horrified that Sydney didn't know that Gale was bringing them together.  Shows some decency in the guy.  It's a little undermined by his protest that he "did his part."

Courtney Cox and David Arquette show better chemistry in this film than they did in the first film.  The scene where he quotes the mean things she says about him, and her sweet smile at how cute she finds him...it's charming.  Jerry O'Connell is so bland, but it's a charming "done on purpose" bland that really brings a lot to the story.  Considering we're supposed to basically cry "It's obviously him" as soon as we see him, his blandness really brings a lot to the table.

Oh, Sarah Michelle Gellar, how I love you.  Again, fun deconstruction stuff happening.  This entire sequence is based on the idea that, at the time, Gellar was playing Buffy.  Buffy, who constantly kicks the crap out of bad guys, is about the get killed.  Cici is actually pretty bright for a side character, defeated by landlines...hilarity.  Hey, kids, here's a history lesson: we had landlines instead of smart phones, we actually talked on those phones instead of texting all the time, and some of us (a rather small amount of us) watched a show called "Buffy:The Vampire Slayer."  Ooh, one weakness:  we see Ghostface kinda do a silly little ballet twirl through the room while Cici is talking to one of her friends.  Not as scary as you think, fellas.  Y'know, the "running out the front door" isn't as smart as you think: it's not like you can't get killed outside.  Run, Buffy, Run!

I liked the soundtrack to this film a lot better than the first one.  I loved the tracks by Everclear, Less Than Jake and Dave Matthews.  By the way, I do an imitation of the lead singer from Everclear that I would classify as pretty good to great.  Bumper sticker: Ask me about my imitation of the lead singer of Everclear.

Timothy Olyphant!  Such a cast in this flick.  Nobody plays intense like Olyphant.  Of course, he's kinda playing a geek here (well, until he's revealed as a killer, of course) and doesn't bring a lot of his intensity until the end.  His scene with Neve in the hospital waiting room was a little pointless, save for Mickey placing doubt on Derek.  O'Connell plays coy pretty well, though.

The "Scream" films love their crane tracking shots.  They're pretty, so I don't blame them.

I don't think I'd ever complain about an armed escort detail when there's a serial killer running around gunning for me.  At the very least, they're good cannon fodder.  They ultimately end up fairly useless...which, of course they are, it's a Wes Craven film.  

The new group of friends outright dismiss Randy as a suspect, which I like.  Even Derek says "What?!" in disbelief when Mickey suggests it.  I actually kinda like the "Top Gun" reference.  It's cheesy, but it's charming enough.  Hard to dislike Derek after that.  It's also hard not to smile as it's happening.

Some more sequel fun at the original's expense.  It's always charming when they do it.  Leads into another rules scene that, at least, makes more sense because the sequel rules are generally not anything of substance.  It just becomes a fun scene that pokes more fun at sequels, which is the entire point of this thing.  So that works better.  The scene also becomes a nice exposition/suspect line-up that doesn't involve a news report.  Progress!

I forgot about the David Warner bit.  I love David Warner.  He doesn't really do anything here besides a pep talk for Neve (which is admittedly important.  Her declaration of "I'm a fighter" is probably one of her few really solid performance moments in this franchise).  The Cassandra monologue is nice (mostly because, hey, greek theater mentioned in a mainstream film is rad).  The performance is pretty cool, too.  I'd watch it.  The Orestia doesn't get much play these days.  Wonderful set-piece for the Ghostface, though.  All the masked, robed figures....really great scene.  

There's something to this "Gayheart and De Rossi are the masterminds" theory.  Man, they are everywhere.  I do like the idea of the friends taking shifts to be with her.  I feel like I'd do the same thing if one of my friends were the target of a serial killer.  Actually, I'd probably never leave their side.  I'd likely die.

This might be as good a time as any to bring up my theory about myself in a slasher film.  People often say "You'd totally survive" a horror movie.  I totally would not.  Unless I made a run for it, which I might.  But in the end, I have more in common with Randy than anyone else and we all know how that ends...in fact, I'm watching that scene right now.  It's kind of a bummer, watching him die.  I don't see myself getting dragged into a van and getting murdered.

Joel the cameraman is amazing.  He brings up, yet again, the trouble with being black in film and then basically says "I'm out of this movie!" and takes off.  I love it.  Jumps in a cab and just bails right out.  Great stuff.

Back to Randy's untimely death. It's a little contrived, but the film knew a couple of things that made it really work.  One, they needed to change things up in the pattern, so Randy biting it goes against the grain and completely throws off the natural order of things. Two, they knew Randy was a popular character, so they knew they could throw a gut punch at the audience by wiping him out.  It's also, as I noted above, a chance to actually kill off the audience.  It basically says "Hey, horror film geeks, you totally don't make it out of this alive."  It's smart.

Also, in my write-up of the original, I mentioned the internet's bargaining over Randy's death.  I read over and over again "There was no body" despite his body being very, very visible.  There was a huge internet fan theory sweeping the web that Randy would ultimately be the killer later, and that his death was faked and blah blah blah.  It's stupid.  I love the character, too, but the film is the film.  There was a body.  Duey says "I called his Mom" and everything.  They're doing the same thing nowadays with Kirby.  There isn't a body shown in that one, but...she also doesn't pop up getting loaded into an ambulance like Duey did at the end of the original.  But we'll get to that when I watch "Scream 4" later. 

I remember being in the theater and whole-heartedly agreeing on Sydney's statement "It shouldn't have been Randy, it should've been me."  Randy was cool, but the killer was right: He's no leading man.  Jamie Kennedy kinda went down the tubes didn't he?

Liev Schrieber does some great work here.   His raspy little giggle is creepy.  There's some smart character work, too: his reflection of Gale and her motivations are well played.  Actually, Gale generally had a pretty darn good arc.  From opportunist to actual heroic motivations...stronger stuff than the original.  

I've been kinda giving the original film more crap in this write-up than I did when I was actually writing up the film itself...I keep saying that this movie is better.  That might actually be true (which is a revelation that I did NOT see coming), but it wouldn't be possible without the original as a template.  I feel I have to make that clear: while "Scream 2" might actually be the better film (still cannot believe I typed that sentence) it only could be because it could skip a lot of things the original couldn't...and that the meta-fiction elements work better because there was an original to lampoon.

The scene between Duey and Gale furthers Gales arc (I almost feel like she's the lead in this flick) and provides some charm.  The seperation between the two when Duey runs off is contrived...but it's worth it for the sound booth moment when Gale just watches Duey get skewered again(which is a great, emotional scene)...strong moment and actually a little scary.  I guess that might be something true as well, the sequel might be a better film but the original was scarier by definition.  I do also have the whole third act to get through, so saying the sequel is better might be counting my chickens.  

Police are useless.  I keep saying it's a Wes Craven thing-and it is in all of his films-but it really is a horror film trope anyway.  At least the one cop actually makes some account of himself on the hood of the car before he gets his head bashed in.  Can I say I've always hated the slow crawl across the apparently unconscious killer?  Just move it along.  I've been in some scary situations in my life, and I've never thought that getting through it more slowly was ever a solution.  Also, I think I might just start smashing the killers face against the steering wheel, or at least punching him over and over again.  

As much as I'd like to...I can't say I liked Callie much as a character.  She really wasn't given much to do at all.  I can't really elaborate on that at all.  I literally have no feelings whatsoever about Callie.  That is apparently so true that I called her Callie when her name is actually Hallie.  Oops.

Nice return to the stage!  Once more, the film tips its hand towards the themes of performance.  From the death of Jada on stage, to the showing of the movie-within-a-movie "Stab", to the use of crowd footage, to Cassandra, and now finally back to the stage for the finale.  It's really smart stuff.

Even Mickey plays the self-aware card.  "I gotta have a partner!"  Hell, even the motive of the killer is about performance.  His motive rant mentions audience, and playing to the crowd...

Oops.  Poor Derek.  I like that Sydney puts her hand directly on the gunshot wound.  I have no idea why, it just works somehow.

"You're forgetting one thing about Billy Loomis."
"Yeah, what's that?"
"I fucking killed him."  It's such a solid line.  I really love it.  Maybe a good bumper sticker.

Oh, yeah.  Billy's Mother.  I forgot.  Boo.  Also, Olyphant falls into that same trap that all these movies do and forgets how to do anything other than spit and foam at the mouth and jump up and down.  Ugh.  Jesus, Laurie Metcalf is even worse.  If her eyes go any wider they're going to explode.  I did forget that the end of this film was awful.  Never forget.  Except I do like Sydney "Isn't Mickey supposed to be dead?" fake out.

Okay, so some recovery: Syd using the stage production as a weapon...that's pretty smart.  It's nice and on theme.  I almost forgot about Cotton showing up again.  Liev does some more good stuff in the finale, actually.  Brings more theatrics.  "You'll be the star!"  He does save the day, albeit it for fairly selfish reasons...even though he says otherwise.  Gale and Sydney do shoot Mickey some more...so there is that.

Joel comes back and works with Gale again!  Yeah, Joel!  Wonderful subversion: Gale passes on reporting live-ignores an audience, if you will-because of Duey.  We also still end with an audience, though.  Cotton talks to an audience while Sydney backs away and walks off into the sunset.  Strong way to bring it all to a close.  One character goes big for theatrics, another wants nothing to do with it.

So, when it all comes down to it...is "Scream 2"  better?  Yeah, I think it might be.  Good use of theme, self-awareness that doesn't cram itself down your throat, some subtlety and some actual character arcs for some minor characters.  There's far more substance here than the original.  The original is scarier, and was totally required for this film to work in any way, shape or form, so...well, okay, equal but different?  Overall I think part two is a stronger film, but part one is a better horror film...does that make sense?  I dunno.  All I know is: I liked the sequel a lot more this time around than I ever had before and that is outright blowing my mind.

Final rating: 3 and half stars.