The Good: There's a lot to like about this movie! The opening prologue was solid and reintroduced the audience to the self-mocking style of the Scream movies. The "Stab" fakeout openings were pretty entertaining and once we got past that, it was great to step into the world where Ghostface hunts again!
Speaking of returning to this world, the returning cast was wonderful! It was great to see Syndey, Gail, and Dewey return. Everyone was in great form and it hardly felt like it had been 10 years since these actors last played these roles. It felt like slipping on an old pair of shoes! In no other horror franchise has a recurring cast lasted through four movies, with all the actors returning. Sydney made a wonderful return and I was glad to see that she retained her strength earned by the end of the 3rd movie and hadn't regressed back into a scared, helpless victim. Gail was as bitchy as ever, and I dug it! Courtney Cox is at her best when she's playing the bitch! I'm not sure if she would take that as a compliment or not. And thank god, thank... GOD... her hair has improved a billion times more since the 3rd movie! David Arquette's Dewey has made a good evolution to the role of local town sheriff. It fits very well with how his character had progressed since the 1st movie.
Aside from simply returning to the characters, I was fairly pleased with the roles assigned to each of our veterans. Sydney doesn't really have much of a character arc here because her story's pretty much been told. She's not afraid and she's not unsure of herself anymore. In this case, she's the strong, confident veteran who acts as a sort of rock for the younger cast to learn respect for. Gail continues to try and break free of the small town life she feels trapped in, and Dewey attempts to establish and maintain respect and credibility as a leader of law enforcement in Woodsboro. No one really has anything new to learn about themselves in this one, but that feels more okay because they've grown up now and are more established in who they are.
But, what about the newer cast? I've got a point to discuss about them in the "Bad" section of this review, but all in all, I liked them! I thought they did a good job of feeling like modern teens. Emma Roberts played well as Jill and I didn't really appreciate her until the end when she made the heel turn (discussed more down below). Hayden Panettiere's Kirby was pretty cool (though I hated the short hair). I dug her knowledge and enthusiasm for the genre! Our two film nerds played well and I dug the head gear with the camera on it (how the hell would that thing keep picking up an internet signal when he's walking everywhere?!). The young cop girl with a crush on Dewey felt like a backup character in case Courtney Cox decided not to return. Everyone played their parts well and I'd say it's the best supporting cast for the series since the first movie. The only disappointment was that we didn't get enough with them!
As for the story itself, I really liked the concept! The Scream movies have always tackled a different aspect of the horror genre in it's sequels. This one focused on the slew of remakes that Hollywood's been producing in the past 10 years. Ghostface's desire to remake the original Scream was clever. Duplicating a lot of the elements from the original movie worked well. It anchored the movie to a story outline that was familiar and worked, while still letting it branch out into new territory. I wish more franchises would take a look at Scream 4 when thinking about doing a remake. When Kirby rattles off the list of every remake she can think of, its jarring to realize just how many horror movies have been remade this decade! Jeez, Hollywood, have an original thought!
The party near the end was pretty solid and left me guessing on who the killer/s would be until the reveal. On a side note, when they were looking at Kirby's DVD collection, was anyone else shocked at how small it was, considering what a movie buff she was suppose to be! Props for owning Suspiria, though! She gets some cred for that!
The revelation and motives of the killers was clever! Well, specifically, Jill's reveal. I dug it! I really fit with the world of today where a teen will get pregnant just to be on MTV or a girl will leak a sex tape online to become famous. Its a weird world out there today and Jill's skewed perspective wasn't that tragically far from how people really think today. Her desire to be the new Sydney was clever and made me really appreciate her earlier scenes much more! Not to mention that she does more damage to Syd than any other Ghostface has. When she stabbed Sydney and started preparing the scene for the cops' arrival, I really thought she was going to get away with it. Hell, I wanted her to get away with it! Cut credits right as Jill's being loaded into the ambulance and the press is surrounding her! It was perfect! Imagine!! If Sydney died right there and Jill became the new heroine, that's a really original, creepy idea! Scream 5 writes itself from there! A new Ghostface hunting Jill and she has to play the helpless girl to everyone when she secretly hunts down her stalker! Ghostface vs. Ghostface!! God, that would have been awesome! I was thinking about all of this while watching the last scene of the movie and was completely rooting for Jill to succeed!
The Bad: As much as I liked this movie, there were definitely a few things I was disappointed by. First off, I know I'm in the minority on this, but I was a little let down by the opening sequence! The multiple fakeout made it more comedy and camp than I would hope for. One fakeout is clever. Two fakeouts is a joke.
Throughout the movie, there were chunks where everything was flowing beautifully! It was smart, witty, and engaging. Then, it seemed to change. It would have weird moments where I felt like we were missing something. Turns out, we were missing a lot and the more I realized, the more I have a burning desire to see a full, extended version of this movie! I'm going to focus on two scenes in particular:
The opening scene. The whole opening scene was reshot for the final version. But, we also lost the scene of Dewey arriving to the house and examining the carnage. The movie talked about remaking the original Scream (or "Stab"), but I never caught onto that until the second half of the movie! It seems like all the remake shots were cut from the 1st half! This was one of them! Finding one girl's body strapped to a chair while the other is hung from the ceiling, guts spilled out, harkens back to Casey & Steve's demise in the original movie. It's a gory looking scene and would have immediately pounded home the idea of the movie being a "remake."
Second from the cutting room floor was the fountain scene with the new cast. In every Scream sequel, the new characters always feel underused, because the majority of time is spent focusing on the returning characters. Scream 4 suffers from this as well and the young teens don't get nearly enough time on screen for the audience to really attach to them. A scene of them discussing the recent killings, by the fountain used in the first movie, would have helped to reinforce the remake idea while also giving us a chance to see these characters in their natural element. It's a real shame this was cut!
Those are my only real beefs with the movie! Well, that and the stupid girl getting out of her car in the parking garage. For a movie that is aware of the cliches and mocks them, that was just stupid.
Final Word: I really dug Scream 4! It was a lot of fun and probably ranks as the best sequel the series has produced. Its a real shame that the movie has done as poorly as it has at the box office! It deserves better! Sadly, there's not likely to be a Scream 5. If and when the franchise returns, it will likely be as a remake. Considering the message of this particular movie, that's going to be tragically ironic.
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