Written by Kevin Williamson And Guy Busick And James Vanderbilt
Directed by Kevin Williamson
Sidney (to Jessica): "Past my prime? Fuck you!"
I promised myself that when I'd get around to both seeing and reviewing this movie that I was going to be fair and objective with it. I wasn't going to mindlessly bash it or praise it out of my love towards the franchise. I will say one thing though - Spyglass/Paramount your treatment of cast members certainly deserves all the criticism in the world and you should be ashamed of yourselves.
The movie itself decided to go a little nostalgic at the beginning. The home of Stu Macher (Matthew Lillard) was now a tourist attraction. This was a way to introduce Stab fan Scott (Jimmy Tatro) and girlfriend, Madison (Michelle Randolph) into the mix. They also made up the opening kills with the latter getting the sort of death that she didn't want to happen to her.
That's your lot for Woodsboro because the rest of the movie took place in Pine Grove. Sidney Prescott-Evans (Neve Campbell) ran The Little Latte cafe, was married to a cop named Mark (Joel McHale) and was struggling to connect with her oldest daughter, Tatum (Isabel May). Tatum wanting to know more about her mother's past was a source of contention for Sidney. You'd think by now Sidney would realise that she can't avoid her past.
In fact this movie kind of drove that point home. Ghostface rocked up in Pine Grove and began to make the usual threats to Sidney. Soon enough, Tatum's friend circle were dropping like flies. The likes of Hannah Turman (McKenna Grace), Chloe Parker (Celeste O'Connor), Lucas Bowden (Asa Germann) and even boyfriend Ben Brown (Sam Rechner) were all subjected to a variety of gruesome deaths but had little characterisation before meeting their ends.
As a friendship circle, they're disappointing in the sense that they're not fleshed out particularly well. Tatum herself fared better but being the daughter of Sidney and Mark, she kind of had to, didn't she? I do think Isabel May did well with the material that she's given and by the end of the movie, Tatum had a better understanding of who her mother really was.
In terms of returning faces, I actually really liked how Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox) was used in this movie overall. This was a Gale that was going back to her roots and had taken on both Mindy (Jasmin Savoy Brown) and Chad Meeks-Martin (Mason Gooding) as her interns. The twins in particular were utilised rather well and I liked their scenes with Tatum and the latter's friends.
I also loved the examination into Sidney and Gale's complicated relationship and that after thirty years, Gale got to interview Sidney on live television, courtesy of Robbie Rogers (Mark Consuelos). There was something cathartic in that moment with bits of the old Gale resurfacing as both her and Sidney mused the possibility of Stu being alive. Spoiler: he's still dead.
Now, the Ghostface part of this movie would be where a lot of the criticism would be justified. There's Lucas's mother, Jessica (Anna Camp). She was a disillusioned Sidney fangirl who wanted to make Tatum into the new Sidney. Her motive wasn't that outlandish and I think Anna Camp played the reveal part pretty well. Saying that, we've had better female Ghostfaces and that almost included the previous one.
The other two Ghostfaces are almost not worth mentioning because they felt so irrelevant to the plot and had no personal connection to anyone. There was mental patient/serial attacker Karl Gibbs (Kraig Dane) and mental asylum employee Marco Davis (Ethan Embry). The movie did nothing to flesh them out and I was happy to see them out of the way. I honestly think it should've just been Jessica doing everything. It would've worked better overall.
- Sidney's younger daughters, Emma and Rebecca briefly appear but were staying with Mark's mother in Denver.
- Every single Scream movie got a shout-out, including AI cameos from Dewey Riley (David Arquette), Nancy Loomis (Laurie Metcalf) and Roman Bridger (Scott Foley). Jessica was also a big fan of Sidney's Out Of Darkness book and Tatum wore Sidney's leather jacket from the second movie.
- Between movies, Gale lost her morning TV show with a pointed reference to her contract not being renewed. Mindy also wanted to usurp Gale and wasn't shy about it either.
- There's references to some Wes Craven movies, the Halloween franchise (yet again) and in fitting timing, Wuthering Heights.
- Standout music: Wouldn't be this franchise without the use of Red Right Hand. Oh and there's Ice Nine Kills and McKenna Grace's Twisting The Knife.
- Chronology: Began in Woodsboro, was mostly in Pine Grove and took place thirty years after the original movie.
Scream 7 in my opinion doesn't deserve the review bombing it's currently getting. In no universe would I consider this to be a bad movie, even in this franchise alone. At worst/best/take your pick, it's mostly decent with some nice Easter Eggs, some much needed character moments but it's also slightly letdown by a weak third act/Ghostface choices and not doing anything too meaningful with it's commentary on AI and Deep Fakes. I imagine when the heat dies down, it'll be reassessed more favourably as a movie.
Rating: 7 out of 10
No comments:
Post a Comment