SCREAM 3
The third time's the charm.  Yeah right.

  Here's all I remember about Scream 2. For some reason, it opened up to even more rave reviews than the original, and ever since, it's become one of the most hated movies on the internet, probably THE most hated film in alt.horror today, and has been for a couple of years now.  Oh yeah, and that I still owe my friend Will eight bucks for the admission.  I'd love to jump in on either the attacking or defending side of the frothing-at-the-mouth Scream 2 debate, but I don't remember a frame of that movie, and I wasn't even drunk when I saw it.  Well, maybe a little.  That a third movie in this series would not be greeted as a pleasant prospect has never been in doubt.  The real question is, boos and hisses aside, would it be any good?

Wes Craven returns, but not Kevin "I always envisioned it as a trilogy!" Williamson, who was booted from the project for scarcely writing anything at all, I understand.  Always a trilogy.  Suuuure.  After the script going to the guy who wrote Arlington Road (eek), a troubled production (uh-oh), the film is finally released in early February (uh-oh!), and word of mouth has been less than favorable (what's that I smell?).  (not that I'd be all that gung-ho if Williamson was still on board - I loved The Faculty, but I think I've had quite enough way-too-"hip" horror flicks from him)  And today, I had a coupon burning a hole in my pocket that I'd planned on using on Galaxy Quest, but I don't even know where that one's playing anymore, so I guess I'll be waiting til the dollar theaters for that one.

Alright, here's the plot, no points for guessing that there'll be a lot of postmodern in-jokiness and a guy in a Ghostface mask going around killing people.  It's years later (I don't know how many), and poor Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) has changed her name to Laura and works at home for a crisis hotline.  Reporter Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox Arquette) is on the lecture circuit, and Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber) has his own talk show, 100% Cotton (love that title).  And good ol' "Deputey Dewey" (David Arquette) is a technical advisor on the set of the new film Stab 3: Return To Woodsboro.

Now, Stab is the movie-within-a-movie in Scream 2 which was based on the events of first film.  I have no idea what Stab 2 was supposed to be about - whether it was based on the events of the second film or what.  But Stab 3 is, apparently, all fiction.  Y'know, within fiction.  We get to meet some cast members - Parker Posey plays the gal playing Gale, Jenny McCarthy plays, uh, somebody...oh, nobody else comes to mind.

Anyways, Ghostface shows up, kills enough cast members (in the order described by the very-little-seen Stab 3 script) to shut down the production of the film (much to the dismay of the director and producer - Scott Foley and Lance Henriksen respectively), takes responsibility for killing Sidney's mom (whose romantic indiscretions touched off the whole series), and generally makes a big mess of things.  Oh, and you know how in the first two films, the killers all had that voice-disguiser thing that makes them sound like Roger L. Jackson?  Here, this particular device can make anybody sound like anybody.  Uh-huh.  Gimme a call in 2067 when something like that actually exists (or in 2093 when the palm-sized model comes out).

Wow, what's to say about all this - in a liberal nutshell how about simply that it tries WAY too hard to be clever for its own good, and it doesn't help that it isn't nearly as clever as it wants to be.  Despite the hype telling us that the third in a trilogy is all about breaking the rules, this pooch seems totally unaware of how by-the-numbers it delivers its attempt at horror.  At least it's nice to see that Craven heroines still beat the living shit out of their attackers, just before they get killed of course.

The plot of this movie - for anyone who cares about its plot - is gonna be totally incomprehensible to anybody who hasn't seen the original Scream.  (having forgotten almost all of its first sequel, I think I can safely say you can get by without seeing that one)  Putting aside for now the whole movie/movie-within-the-movie thing, where there's always two people playing, in some regards, one role, there's a lot of blubbery exposition referring back to the first film, which even then relied on a lot of preceding events.  I'm reminded of the rumors I'd heard of "fact sheets" handed out at screenings of Dune - this guy is such-n-such, he's doing this because this other guy did this-n-that, you know, that sort of thing.

Just how Sidney's real name and location is figured out, I totally missed out on.  (little help?) I don't really get how one character was supposed to be the third to be killed in Stab 3 but later cries out "But I'm the killer in Stab 3!" or something to that effect when the actress is pounced on by Ghostface.  An exploding house is usually a sign of a screenplay bereft of better ideas, and just how it happens (oh really, NOBODY smelled the gas in all that time?) is silly indeed.  And the identity of who's doing the killing, yes, it totally rewrites Scream history all over the place, but at the same time, it doesn't really matter.  It could have been anybody.  This is not the way to cap off a whodunnit, although I am a shade pleasantly surprised that it wasn't...I don't want to spoil it, but what was a surprise in the first film and strangely appropriate in the second wouldn't have been either here.

The take on women's sexuality presented here, a little disconcerting but no big deal in the original film, is flaunted and (pardon the pun) whored out almost grotesquely.  We basically have two types presented: women screwing their way to success (two Stab 3 actresses, and a very funny cameo from Carrie Fisher), and The Slutty Town Slut Who Got Everybody Killed Because She's Such A Slut And Did We Mention That She's A Slut.  I mean, we got the point in the first film, even if it was a little off-base if you ask me.  Here, it's like Whack-A-Mole where every mole that pops up cries out "SLUUUUUUT!"

And worst of all is Courtney Cox Arquette.  Long and widely understood to be the one cast member of Friends who NOBODY would miss, she's probably the most grating and charmless actress Hollywood has going.  Disregard for now her close-to-freakish skeletal build; I can't listen to two sentences from this woman without crying out for something, ANYTHING else to drown her out.  It doesn't help that the way the plot of the film basically makes hers the most prominent role.  She's horrible, I hope she dies.  Okay, I don't actually hope she dies, but I do hope her vocal cords snap like ukulele strings.

I'm complaining a lot about this movie - and yeah, there's a lot to complain about - but there's enough here that I did like that the end product seems pretty middle-of-the-road.  Craven's direction is in mostly top form for him even if most of the movie deserves only about the effort he put into, say, Deadly Friend.  It's better lit and framed than even the original Scream; there are lots of shots which make me think "Hey, that's kinda neat."  Particularly memorable is one scene in a prop/costume room, where an unlucky lass not only wanders into a room loaded with Ghostface costumes (and you know one of 'em is occupied, but which?) and has lots of knives with which to defend herself; unfortunately for her, they're from the prop department.

Neve Campbell gives it her strong-but-sobbing all, though there isn't nearly enough of her (really, hers is a supporting role).  She's really cute and has an adorable voice I could listen to all day.  What's not to like?  Patrick Dempsey has grown well beyond the annoying teen star he once was and projects a lot of charisma, even if the script doesn't much help him out.  Jamie Kennedy gets in a memorable, funny, and almost touching cameo, undaunted by the fact that his character was killed in Scream 2.  And Parker Posey is just wonderful in her role, livening up the often dreary affair every time she's onscreen.  (note her hilarious justification for hanging around with Gale constantly for the second half of the film)

Definitely not rush-and-see material here, but you could do worse (isn't Supernova still in some theaters?).  Wait til the dollar theaters, at any rate.  Damn, now there's a review-gap in this series for me - now I have to rent Scream 2 and give it another look.  I can already hear people out there pleading "Don't do it to yourself, man!!!"  Hey - I do it so you don't have to.  I don't want applause, I just want to sleep with your sister.

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