Format change!
WEEK FOUR - PAINFUL MEMORIES
October 20
Thoughts before the rewatch: Like many people, this was one of my first R-rated films that I ever saw. After being built up like it was some kind of religious moment by my friends, who of course all saw it multiple times in the theater, a night with little parental supervision had this in the VCR, and I finally got the chance to see. Of course, when your friends build it up as much as they did, feeling underwhelmed in understandable. They thought I was weird for not loving it as much as they did, but hey, that's what kids do: they create legends out of the ordinary.
Years later, and I would say I was probably 20 at this point, I gave it another shot. Without the promise of a bloodbath previously unimagined and more experience watching films for reasons other than to see gore or boobs or gore and boobs, I went in with a much more open mind, and my initial disinterest turned to puzzled disappointment. This was the super-smart satire of the genre, which really didn't amount to much more than some cute references? This was the new generation of teen actors, most of whom were goddamned terrible? This was the work of a master filmmaker, who shot the whole thing with what looked like a fisheye lens? It was at this point that I realized that I wasn't crazy for not liking the film: the rest of the world was, for admonishing it with untold praise and riches, and for making, however briefly, Skeet Ulrich a star. And that's unforgivable.
Years later: I have, perhaps, been a bit unduly harsh on the film, as getting older and having even more experience than I did at 20 has opened up a lot of the film to me, in terms of what can and should be appreciated. But it's also opened up a lot more flaws than I had recognized than before. It has improved, though, which is more than I was expecting.
First, the fisheye lens, or whatever proper technical term is for the lens Craven chose for the film, is still present, and the tracking still moves in a bizarre and displeasing way, visually speaking. It's a shame, too, since Craven does one hell of a great job of staging the various attacks, bringing to them a remarkable sense of kinetic energy and violence that precious few horror films have ever attempted, let alone be successful at. It really feels like Craven and co. wanted to avoid the pratfalls of many slashers, which really never paid attention to the buildup to the gory bits and often skipped to what they thought were "the good parts," and went in the opposite direction. It's a violent, gory film, sure, but those aren't the parts you remember. You remember the frantic scrambling, the smart framing that is just left of your expectations to surprise you than if it went in a totally different direction entirely, the mortality of Ghostface himself that is at complete odds with how these villains tended to be before their comeuppance. Craven is definitely an example of a filmmaker that got a lot better with age, and Scream is probably his strongest film in that regard. Not perfect, as the still-ugly dialogue close-ups still show up with alarming frequency, but the man knows how the hell to put a scene like those I've described together.
What's also interesting, and something I definitely wouldn't have been able to piece together back then, is the way a few of the kills are executed. Perhaps remembering a bit of his Last House on the Left, the sexual assault imagery is on full display, with a lot of the kills feeling more like straight-up rapes than mere stabs. Sure, it's not like the connection hadn't ever been made before Scream, but it's never been shown this explicitly. It lends the early attacks a very intriguing edge to them that none of its progeny like I Know What You Did Last Summer or *shudder* Urban Legend bothered to look into, which makes it a shame that it loses sight of them as the movie progresses and gets less and less interested in maintaining that kind of violence and devolves into more traditional, mundane portrayals. Perhaps that this is where the script fails the most, as the more obvious slasher trope poking begins taking center stage, and often feels a lot less clever than screenwriter Kevin Williamson thinks they are. I described those bits as being cute more than anything else, and that still applies. Scenes, like Randy being stalked by Ghostface while watching Laurie in his magically morphing mash-up copy of Halloween and Halloween 2 (didn't think I'd notice, huh, film?!?) being stalked by Ghostface, which is then watched by Sidney and the cameraman while he munches on some Cheetos, really don't add a lot to the tension, and serve to drag an already long film down even more. The daytime stalking montage also makes very little sense, as it only exists to be a really obvious nod to Halloween than establishing any kind of unsettling menace to Ghostface. And the film's finale just goes on and on and on and on, thanks to stuffing in as much as possible. Again, it's really a length issue that dooms those scenes to being cute, rather than essential. It's fine to know and respect your influences, but there wasn't a lot of call for them to go overboard with them.
While Williamson's script isn't nearly as much of a game-changer that many thought it was, he does have a much better handle on people talk than I think I ever gave him credit for before tonight. It's smart dialogue, but not so smart as to be distracting, and the characters themselves do have unique voices that make them far more than just mere cannon fodder, and in theory, make you care about them. In theory, of course, since most of the actors are still terrible. I finally made the connection tonight that Neve Campbell is basically the Kristen Stewart of the late 90s, right down to the frequent lip pouting and monotone line delivery that we've come to be so familiar with the Twilight star and what both try to pass off as emoting. Rose McGowan has her full-on Rose McGowan schtick in full effect, sounding really disinterested in doing anything other "Rose McGowan would rather be somewhere else, but hey, she likes swearing a bunch." Jaime Kennedy is fine, but he has the unfortunate task of having the film's least meaty role, relegated to the scenes requiring the tropes to be paraded out, and really doesn't serve much of a point beyond them. Matthew Lillard's Stu is a lot less endearing now, since he doesn't really know to dial down the crazy long enough for him to be anything else, but at least he's not fucking Skeet Ulrich, who is even worse than I remembered. Doing little more than cocking his head forward, arching his eyes upward, peering through his fussy bangs, and delivering a horrible Johnny Depp impersonation, he has neither the ability to bring forth the dark undertones of his character of Billy, nor can he sell any line in the film without sounding completely insincere in any reading. One might say it helps his Billy out, since he's anything but sincere, but there's a fine line between what's appropriate for the role and what's counted as lack of talent, and Skeet Ulrich teeters too far into the latter to give him the benefit of the doubt. The best actors in the film are unsurprisingly the ones with previous experience, like Drew Barrymore (whose brief screentime is maximized in the film's thrilling introduction) and Courtney Cox (Gale is still one of the best sneering bitches with a heart of gold in the genre), and while I certainly would never claim David Arquette as being a good actor, he acquits himself well as the charmingly aloof Dewey.
The half-measures are what I take the most issue with now, more than anything else, as it seems like there's a lot in the film that's trying to prevent it from being a success that it could have been. Craven's direction certainly begs for a stronger film to be in, which is why the first ten minutes work so well, as it's the core of the film's concept boiled down to its absolute essentials with no fluff, no filler, nothing to get in way of the suspense and the terror. Perhaps it was always going to be doomed after such a strong start, but you do wish it didn't. My puzzlement no longer remains, but the disappointment does. It does try hard, though, and I do have to give it credit for the successes it does have as a result.
October 21 preview: We move onto a psychological horror film that wants to be a lot more than just that.
Black Swan has a rightly praised lead performance from Natalie Portman, but I felt that she did a lot more heavy lifting for the film's failures than many seem to realize. Let's find out if that feeling deserves to linger.
