Updated: 6 July 1997

SCREAM

I'm not too familiar with this genre. For others in my shoes, I think this is a good movie to start with.

To be honest, I've never been particularly interested in this sort of film before. I've never seen a NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, a HALLOWEEN, a FRIDAY THE 13th, or any of the other mad slasher flicks. They looked corny in the extreme. Besides, for a good scare, why go any farther than a Hitchcock or an ALIEN movie. Same terror, better production values.

But then SCREAM came along, and received such rave reviews that I decided I had to give it a go.

So I got my popcorn and a Root Beer, and waited until it was very late, and started the show. The show began after more previews than the last three movies I've rented put together. They were evidently expecting this to be a big hit on the rental front.

The first fifteen minutes or so are arguably the best. Drew Barrymore is a very convincing high school student at home making some popcorn. The phone rings...a wrong number, she ends up wishing.

After this very effective opening sequence, the main plot begins. We are introduced to our spunky heroine, Sydney, and her father and boyfriend. The circle of her friends widens the next day at school as she learns of the grisly murder the night before. We meet several future victims and near victims, and while doing so, quickly learn that the last murder in the town was almost exactly a year before, and was Sydney's mother.

I was surprised at first by some nice little details in filming that, I admit, I wasn't expecting. But in the end, this is a slasher film, no matter how polished. And when a few very stupid moments pop up, they merely affirm this. One such moment has Sydney and her best friend, Tatum, shopping in their local grocery store in preparation for a party that night, and reflected in the glass we see the killer flitting by another aisle over. Kind of hard to miss, you'd think. These cashiers must really be overworked.

Besides that and a few other bits like it, this was a well-done scary movie. The only other problem I had with it was the ending. By the end, most everybody has been killed, or at least sustained an amazing number of what looked like fatal wounds. Very tough people, these. Anyway, the ending dwindles to what I imagine the rest of the crop to be: a lot of gore and clichés. Nevertheless, the movie as a whole provides a pretty frightening bit of excitement. And that is what we rent these for, after all. But it doesn't quite take the place of Sigourney Weaver being hunted by a mad mother alien.