Scream, released in 1996, was directed by the legendary Wes Craven, and stars Neve Campbell, Matthew Lillard, David Arquette, Courtney Cox, and Skeet Ulrich, with a cameo from Drew Barrymore. Scream follows Sidney Prescott, who is being targeted by a mysterious killer known only as ghostface. By the 90’s, slasher films were on their last leg. The cliches had worn out their welcome and horror genre was dying because of it. Then, along came Scream.
Scream turned the entire genre on its head. It was so self aware of itself, and referenced how dumb some situations are in horror movies, and made fun of them. Cliches such as the splitting up of a group while a killer is hunting them, or the idea that the virgin always ends up being the last girl left alive. Scream is the perfect example of how to subvert expectations and an entire genre successfully. Another thing this film is known for is its memorable killer. When I was a kid, I remember seeing countless ghostface costumes for Halloween. It seemed like group had a kid that was dressed up as ghostface. That shows how great of a look this killer had to him. It was simple, yet effective. The characterization of ghostface was also more realistic to a real serial killer. He trips, stumbles and isn’t perfect when trying to kill his victims. The opening of this film is also easily recognizable with the killer calling his victim, played by Drew Barrymore, asking her various horror movie trivia questions. If she guessed wrong, he would kill her.
This film warrants several revisits in my opinion. As your knowledge of film and of horror film in general grows, you can start to see more subtle details and commentary that were put in the film. Not that this can’t be enjoyable upon your first viewing, because it’s fantastic whether it be your 1st, or 100th time watching it.
There is a reason that Scream is the highest grossing slasher film of all time. It brought an entire genre back from the brink of destruction, all while creating a commentary about the genre it was satirizing. Scream is one of the best slasher films of all time in my opinion and is a staple of my Halloween watching marathon, so I highly recommend giving this one a shot. And honestly, Scream 2 isn’t bad either.