The new Scream is a very clever movie. One that taps into everything from how the horror genre has changed over the last two decades, to Hollywood’s obsession with sequels and reboots, to our shifting public discourse in the face of the Internet and social media. It is sly. It is snappy. It is knowing. The new Scream feels like the kind of movie that was made by a group of people who love the original movies and truly understand what they’re all about.
Which, as we all know, is an incredibly rare thing in Hollywood. Especially when it comes to revitalizing a classic franchise.
This new Scream is as good as it gets when it comes to requels. What this new Scream isn’t, however, is scary in any way. But I’ll get to that.
Do You Like Scary Movies?
Scream (or Scream 5, or 5cream – why it isn’t called either of these is explained in the movie) begins, as it should, with a phone call. Here Jenny Ortega’s Tara Carpenter (in homage to John?) is the stand-in for Drew Barrymore. Just like in the original, she is home alone when she receives a phone call from an unknown number and is forced to play horror movie trivia with the psychopath at the other end of the line. Their conversation, however, is different this time. In the 25 years since the first Scream, we have broadened our definition of horror cinema, and this is reflected when Tara, in response to the caller’s question about her favorite horror movie, responds with some superiority and says that it is an “elevated horror” like The Babadook.
All of this is done with a knowing wink at the audience and, in staying true to the franchise, keeps things meta without tripping into parody.
Tara is then brutalized by someone in a Ghostface mask. She survives. But the attack brings her estranged sister, Sam (Melissa Barrera) back into town, with her boyfriend Richie (Jack Quaid) in tow. Like Sydney Prescott (Neve Campbell), Sam too is haunted by her family’s history. She’s got a secret and it looks like someone’s found out what it is.
What follows is a tightly plotted cat and mouse whodunnit with some fun banter, thrilling set pieces, and just enough nudging and winking. The movie isn’t necessarily breaking any new ground, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t effective. The new cast are pitch perfect and a joy to watch. They may lean into melodrama from time to time, but the chemistry between them closely mimics that of their original counterparts.
If you’ve seen even a single poster for this movie, then you also know that Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, and David Arquette are all back for this installment. If you’re a fan of the originals, then you’ll no doubt get a kick watching this trio back on screen. But directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett use them sparingly, just enough to provide the necessary seasoning without overpowering the final dish.
Everybody’s a Suspect!
So how does Scream fare as a requel?
For the uninitiated, a “requel” (or “legacyquel”) is a movie that isn’t a reboot and not quite a sequel, that builds on the legacy of the original, providing just enough fan service to satisfy longtime devotees, while still carving out its own path. Some of them ignore the fact that the lesser sequels (or prequels) exist (see: Halloween, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, etc.), while others try to retcon their storylines in order to retroactively disappear the offending installments (see: X-Men: Days of Future Past). Some of them work by bringing back beloved aging stars to pass the torch to a younger generation (see: Star Wars: The Force Awakens), while others are just looking to pick up where the story left off (see: Cobra Kai).
Whatever form they may take, the “requel” has become an incredibly lucrative way for Hollywood to revitalize – and milk – their aging intellectual properties. Some work better than others. And the ones that don’t are usually shameless nostalgia plays that fail to grasp what made the original so unique.
As far as requels go, Scream is right up there with the best of them. Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, along with writers James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick, have made a movie that deftly balances nostalgia and newness to give us a movie that feels consistent without being derivative. The references to the original Scream are purposefully delivered with just a little bit of a twist. And all of it, while incredibly self-aware, never comes across as smug.
Ironically, the movie that this one owes its greatest debt to isn’t the original Scream, but rather its predecessor. Wes Craven’s New Nightmare, the seventh installment in the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise, wasn’t a direct sequel but a meta-horror in which Freddy Krueger is a fictional movie villain who invades the real world and haunts the cast and crew who make movies about him. The movie was both a shot in the arm to a franchise that had long since lost its way, and the foundational text upon which the Scream movies were built. Where it directly inspires this movie, however, is in the complex questions it asks about the impact of horror movies on those who make it and on those who watch it. And it is where this Scream is at its most intriguing.
You’re Not Scared, Are Ya?
That said, Scream spends so much time being a meta-reference to the original that it doesn’t even try to be an actual horror movie. It’s almost too clever for its own good. We’re so in awe, so preoccupied by how it pulls off the fine balancing act of being a successful requel, that we forget to jump at the scares.
Take, for example, the opening sequence of both Scream movies. That prologue from the first Scream is a stunning act of fear, tension, and suspense. It’s in the way the camera stalks Drew Barrymore in her own home. It’s in how the constant ringing of a telephone increases the sense of impending doom. It is the perfect example of Wes Craven’s genius, of how he expertly builds anxiety – in both his characters and the audience – one “oh shit” moment after another, until finally delivering the killing blow. I’ve seen those first 13 minutes so many times and it never stops being scary. The recreation in this movie, however, while artful, just doesn’t inspire the same kind of terror.
The same goes for many of the movie’s other set pieces. There’s an extended sequence in a kitchen that’s clever, and funny, but not much more. There’s a hospital attack that’s reminiscent of the best of John Carpenter, and while it’s expertly pulled off, there is very little about it that was genuinely frightening.
The best horror movies are the ones with something to say. That aren’t just concerned with schlock and gore. That don’t just exist to shock you with cheap scares. Scream has a lot to say, I just wish it was also a little scary.
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