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SCREAM - COLLECTOR'S EDITION


Reviewed by: Sacha Campbell
Genre: Horror
Video: Widescreen letterbox 2.35:1
Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1 (English)
Language: English
Subtitle: English
Length: 111 min.
Rating: R
Release Date: December 2, 1997
Studio: Buena Vista
Commentary: There is simultaneous commentary by director Wes Craven and screenwriter Kevin Williamson
Documentaries: None
Featurettes: Behind-the-scenes footage of the film between and during takes; "Scream" Q & A with cast and crew members
Filmography/Biography: Biographies of cast and crew
Interviews: None
Trailers/TV Spots: The original theatrical trailer for "Scream" accompanied by TV spots.
Alternate/Deleted Scenes: None
Music Video: None
Other: Production art & special effects (conceptual drawings, plaster models, etc.); film facts (text)
Cast and Crew: Neve Campbell, Skeet Ulrich, Drew Barrymore, Courtney Cox, David Arquette, Matthew Lillard, Rose McGowan, Jamie Kennedy, Liev Schreiber
Screenplay by: Kevin Williamson
Produced by: Cathy Konrad, Cary Woods, Dixie J. Capp, Harvey Weinstein, Bob Weinstein, Nicholas Mastandrea, Marianne Maddalena, Stuart M. Besser
Directed By: Wes Craven
Music: Marco Beltrami
The Review: The crowned king of horror is back, and after a disappointing run with the Eddie Murphy vehicle "Vampire In Brooklyn", Craven has hit pay dirt with a movie that is ironically a satire of his own work in the horror genre. Charmed by first-time screenwriter Kevin Williamson's whimsical draft, Craven partnered with the young go-getter and on a budget of $15 million made a film that grossed over $100 million in the United States alone. Craven is not one to waste much time giving us the goods when it comes to his freaky flicks. In the fashion of "When A Stranger Calls", a young pretty blonde named Casey Becker (Barrymore) answers her telephone in the early evening hours in Woodsborough, a small and virtually crime-free town. Sudden danger is the furthest thing from her mind as she tends to her popcorn on the stove, prepared to watch one of her favorite scary movies. She lifts the receiver and almost immediately is hounded by the menacing tone on the other end of the line, forced to participate in a maniacal game of horror movie trivia to save her own life. Unfortunately, she gets a question wrong and she, along with her hapless boyfriend Steve, are the first in a long line of doomed souls. Although the movie begins with Casey and Steve's brutal demise, the main focus of the film is on Sidney Prescott (Campbell), a precocious high school student whose mother was brutally raped and murdered barely a year before. Once Sidney and other Woodsborough natives get wind of the gruesome homicides the town becomes a media circus. The high school campus alone is swamped by local authorities and insatiable reporters, amongst them all a particularly rapacious tabloid journalist named Gale Weathers (Cox). Gale is no stranger to the town's history - she cashed in on Sidney's misfortune by writing a tell-all chronicle of Maureen Prescott's murder and declaring that Cotton Weary (Schreiber), the man who was indicted, is innocent and that the real killer is still at large. Since then, Gale has become Sidney's worst enemy and she makes it known with her angry fists. Besides her battles with Gale, Sidney becomes the Woodsborough killer's focus and is relentlessly taunted by his menacing phone calls, not to mention his ghoulish get-up and gleaming butcher knife (which he adeptly wipes clean after each kill). All the while, her boyfriend Billy Loomis (Ulrich) becomes the prime suspect and she begins to wonder just who to trust. The body count continues to rise and before you know it, it seems that Sidney has no chance of survival. But like all good horror movies should have, there's a juicy twist at the end and we discover the raison d'etre behind the killer's exclusive list of victims. Upon a first viewing, avid horror fans or ingénues to the genre will be on the edge of their seats all the way and jump at every surprise around the corner. To a seasoned movie critic, a stark realization comes very quickly as to just how tongue-in-cheek this film is but Craven's directorial style still manages to grab you like the rest. There's a lot of inside jokes sprinkled evenly throughout the film that horror movie aficionados will appreciate; Craven even dares to make himself the butt of a few jokes to show what a healthy sense of humor he has. Williamson's screenplay has the characters assuming a rather blasé attitude in the beginning, even amidst all the subsequent chaos. Not only do they have frank discussions about mutilated bodies but one of them even coaches the others on the key elements to surviving a horror scenario. Laughing in the face of death is an approach Craven and Williamson gleefully experiment with the whole way through. "Party Of Five" veteran Neve Campbell is the beleaguered Sidney Prescott, investing her character with as much personality as possible. A lot of what she does here is get upset and - of course - scream her lungs out. There are times when I think she's not putting enough into her role, but I have to realize she's playing a teenager and it's a much more realistic portrait than, for example, the ridiculous traits that the neophytes of Dawson's Creek are endowed with. Skeet Ulrich fairs well as Billy Loomis, the boyfriend that is ever under suspicion. He's a fairly handsome chap but someone PLEASE get his hair out of his eyes, for crying out loud! Those scraggly bangs that never seem to stay tucked behind his ears were quite an annoyance for me, not to mention his constant upward glances when conducting his dialogue - he seldom looks a character full in the face. Aside from Rose McGowan's continually tacky sense of fashion, she's the worst performance in the movie. Her delivery is so snide and her character is such a twit that you wish Tatum were added to the body count earlier in the film. Matthew Lillard is overblown with his obnoxious surfer boy shtick (which can also be seen in "She's All That"). This is one of his worst performances, not to mention his most grating. Like Tatum, I prayed for Ghostface to skewer Stu in the first half hour. David Arquette is the strangest casting choice of all and he seems paranoid every minute he's on camera. I kept thinking to myself, "What the hell is wrong with that guy? Get him some Valium, for Pete's sake!" Fortunately, Courtney Cox is the luminary of this mediocre troupe as the love-to-hate-her Gale Weathers, a part completely out of type from her sunshiney role as Monica on "Friends". She gleefully takes advantage of the cutthroat nature of her character, playing her to the hilt with her mega-bitch aura ever intact. Consistently clad in vivid-colored ensembles and fire-engine red lipstick, Gale is a force to be reckoned with and she lets no one forget it. I have realized that after seeing this film for the third time, it's not the acting that's to be commended but the general idea. The concept alone is the movie's greatest asset and without it or its innovative creators, "Scream" would've choked on its own breath.
Image and Sound Image and Sound is top notch. Colors are clear and bright; not only does Courtney Cox don a lot of crimson hues in her costumes but blood is also a very common sight here and that's something to be careful about with a transfer. The color red literally "screams" at you whenever it appears on screen but there is never any apparent bleeding or garishness. As for sound, it's often very easy for dialogue to get lost amidst a heart-racing score of wailing violins and thunderous drumbeats. Surprisingly, a character's panicked breaths can distinctly be heard while the suspenseful symphony rolls on. Sound effects, score and dialogue are beautifully layered and for the person who has a top-notch stereo system, this will completely refine the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio.
The Extras "Scream" has a good variety of extras, including an amusing Production Featurette. The featurette is basically a conglomerate of several candid interviews with the movie's stars intermingled with film clips and behind-the-scenes material. It's almost the kind of plug you would see while watching E! Entertainment Television's "Behind-The-Scenes" and "Coming Attractions" combined. It also has candid shooting footage segments titled "On The Scream Set" and "Drew Barrymore". Both the segments are behind-the-scenes style footage that was captured in between actual takes. You get a better idea of what Scream's locales look like, the conditions of the set and just how much of a crew it takes to create a good take, whether it be seconds or minutes long. The Special Effects Gallery displays some excellent conceptual drawings of the Casey/Steve death sequence, plaster molds for the Barrymore dummy and several penciled caricatures that finally led to the Edvard Munch-inspired "Scream" mask. Other extras include an amusing Q & A with cast and crew members, the questions of a facetious nature ("What's your favorite scary movie?" and "Why are people so fascinated by horror films?"). There are also cast and crew profiles, your basic text summaries with information a lot of people know already and little things we don't. "Did You Know?" is your basic movie trivia, most of them the same as the trivia found on IMDB but there's a few surprises here and there. This is for die-hard horror movie fans and trivia junkies only - others could care less about factoids such as "How many times was the movie 'Halloween' mentioned throughout the entire film?". The Additional Titles section is a clever way for Buena Vista to promote their other films - they offer titles such as "From Dusk Till Dawn", "Scream 2" (of course), "The Crow", "Mimic", "Halloween: H20" (quelle surprise!) and "Pulp Fiction".
Commentary Once the commentary began, I found out an interesting fact: "Scream" was originally slated for the generic title "Scary Movie". How ironic that Wes Craven created a franchise that the Wayans brothers parodied to great effect and essentially stole the very title from their source of inspiration! Craven also mentions several times how he grudgingly sacrificed his artistic gore to appease the ever-prudent MPAA. Particular scenes edited for content include the segment in the very beginning of the film during the brutal murders of Casey Becker (Drew Barrymore) and her boyfriend Steve. Craven and his team of prosthetic artists created a lifelike dummy from plaster molds of Barrymore's distinctive visage and decorated the doll's abdomen with horrifyingly realistic blood-soaked entrails. The same was done with Steve but the camera focused upon his entire abdomen while he was "gutted like a fish". The MPAA scoffed at the embellished carnage and ordered Craven to turn the gross-o-meter down several notches. Craven, as well as screenwriter Kevin Williamson, was dissatisfied with the final outcome of the opening sequence and expressed his dismay by informing the audience of how much of his glorious gore was forfeited to - excuse the expression - make the "cut". A lot of Craven's influence for the film is derived from other renowned horror flicks, "Halloween" in particular. There's a line stolen directly from the movie ("Go down the street to the Mackenzie's house…"), a reference in the frightening trivia questions between Casey Becker and Ghostface, and lastly a group of students begin watching the flick during a house party towards the climax of the film. Other references include Craven's "A Nightmare On Elm Street", Fred Walton's "When A Stranger Calls", Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho" and William Friedkin's "The Exorcist". Craven also makes an effort to compliment his actors and he pointed my attention to a cameo I never even noticed before - "Exorcist" star Linda Blair makes a brief appearance as a fanatical reporter among the horde of tabloid journalists on the Woodsborough campus. Both Craven and Williamson follow each scene with a little tidbit of trivia and a chuckle among themselves. This is basically two people with a college boy-mentality exchanging quips and enjoying their inside jokes a little too much, but it makes for interesting banter. One will learn a lot of interesting facts about "Scream" by listening closely in between Craven's and Williamson's boisterous giggles.
Final Words: This is an excellent DVD for horror fans with plenty of extras to satiate most cravings. My only qualm with this disc is there is no immediate menu - the ENTIRE movie must be fast-forwarded to reach the extras. Very irritating, but again this was my only problem as it good qualities outweighed the bad. I'm not a fan of Wes Craven's movies or horror in general, but I can say that this collector's series disc just might sway the less inclined.


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 June 26, 2001