In order to illustrate exactly what’s so wrong with Matt Bettinelli-Olphin and Tyler Gillet’s Scream (from here on referred to as 5cream, because I genuinely think I might have a psychotic break if I keep trying to talk about both the original film and this reboot), I’ll present to you a working theory of mine about the intentions behind Wes Craven’s Scream series and how they slowly changed over time. You see, the Scream movies have never really focused on “criticism,” as we might imagine it — they’re not dialectical takedowns of the horror genre or anything — but, as is especially true with the first two parts, used audience expectations and the codifications of well-worn genre conventions to surprise and entertain a media-literate audience of amateur film nerds. Now, I’m not talking about the Tarantino-style dude who worked a video store and spent their weekends in college drunkenly arguing about whether or not Tsui Hark or John Woo was the best filmmaker to emerge from Hong Kong in the ’80s: I’m really just referring to the kind of culture-consuming person who processed a ton of slasher films while growing up and became able to anticipate what was going on just through experience. It’s easy to see, say, Seth Green’s character as a form of Craven pulling back the curtain and revealing the secret texts of the Right-Hand Path of Horror for the masses, but I’d argue he’s simply telling the crowd what they already know through experience and making them aware of just how clearly those behind how keenly they’re aware that the ticket-buyers know more than they’re often given credit for. Scream and Scream 2, its superior sequel, are anarchic romps through the slasher subgenre and are, of course, incredibly entertaining. Craven’s an undisputed master of the form, and the movies themselves are genuinely well-constructed on a scene-by-scene level filmmaking-wise and well-considered as a thematic whole.
