Scary Movie is a 2000 horror comedy parody film directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans, as part of Warner Bros. Entertainment. It is an American dark comedy which heavily parodies the horror, slasher, and mystery genres. Several mid- and late-90s films and TV shows are spoofed, most predominantly Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer, along with The Sixth Sense, The Usual Suspects, The Matrix, The Blair Witch Project, and Dawson's Creek.

The tagline reads "No mercy. No shame. No sequel.", the last reference being an ironic nod towards the tendency of popular horror movies becoming cash cow franchises. 2001 saw the release of Scary Movie 2, with the appropriate tagline "We lied". Later video covers of the first film frequently drop the tagline's third statement. The film was originally titled "Last Summer I Screamed Because Halloween Fell on Friday the 13th". Scary Movie was followed by three more sequels Scary Movie 2 (2001), Scary Movie 3 (2003), and Scary Movie 4 (2006). Its title serves as a homage to the production title of Scream, which was also released through Dimension Films. In early 2013, Scary Movie 5 will be released.^[1]

Plot[link]

An 18-year-old girl named Drew Decker (Carmen Electra) receives a threatening phone call while home alone one night. In an opening which closely mirrors Scream, Drew is chased outside by Ghostface, who then rips off her sweater and skirt, leaving her clothed in her white bra and thong. Drew runs through her garden sprinklers but she is then stabbed in the breast by Ghostface, removing one of her silicone breast implants, hit by a car driven by her father (who was getting oral sex by his wife so he didn't notice Drew), and then killed by Ghostface.

The next day, Cindy Campbell (Anna Faris), meets up with her boyfriend Bobby Prinze (Jon Abrahams) and her friends, Brenda Meeks (Regina Hall), Ray Wilkins (Shawn Wayans), Greg Phillipe (Lochlyn Munro), and Buffy Gilmore (Shannon Elizabeth). Various news teams - including hack reporter Gail Hailstorm (Cheri Oteri) - converge on the school in the wake of Drew's brutal death. Gail hooks up with Buffy's mentally disabled brother Doofy (Dave Sheridan), hoping to milk the facts out of him. One day, while Cindy is in class, someone mysteriously leaves a note saying I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST HALLOWEEN. Cindy then realizes that Drew's murder occurred exactly one year after she and her friends accidentally killed a man during a wild car ride (but the man is shown only to be unconscious and tries to tell them before being knocked out again). Unwilling to face incarceration, the next day a series of increasingly bizarre events take place. Various members of the group receive threatening notes from Ghostface and are rapidly dispatched, but most remain steadfastly oblivious to the rising body count. The killer then attacks Cindy in her house. She tries to call the police but the killer escapes. Bobby arrives at her house but Ghostface (before he left) drops the knife and gloves which leads Cindy to thinking that Bobby is the killer the police arrest him (though he is let out the next day). Greg is killed by Ghostface in plain view. Buffy tries to get help, but Buffy is at a beauty pageant and her talent was acting so they thought the cries were part of her act. Buffy, high on the success brought by the murder, becomes Ghostface's next victim. During the murder, Buffy thinks it's a game, so she does every cliche done by a white female in a horror film. Ghostface decapitates her (even though her head keeps talking afterwards). Later, Ghostface sticks his penis through Ray's head, seemingly killing him. Ghostface then attempts to dispose of Brenda during a showing of Shakespeare in Love, but the moviegoers, fed up with Brenda's constant loud interruptions during the movie, stab her repeatedly, seemingly killing her.

Cindy throws a house party, hoping for safety in numbers. During the party, Bobby and Cindy go up stairs and have sex, no longer making Cindy a virgin. Ghostface unexpectedly appears and stabs Bobby, before disappearing quickly. Cindy gets a gun from a drawer near the entrance, Bobby follows and she tends to his wounds. Shorty (Marlon Wayans), Brenda's stoner brother, comes up from the basement and informs them that the killer has murdered everybody in the house. Bobby takes the gun and shoots Shorty, revealing that his wound was an elaborate ruse. Ray then arrives on the scene - whereupon Bobby reveals to Cindy that he is now gay, and so is Ray - though Ray immediately denies it, despite his repeated homosexual advances and tendencies displayed throughout the movie. They announce their plan to kill her father and frame her sister. Bobby says he did it because Cindy never had sex with him and Bobby gleefully points out that even though their plan lacks sense it doesn't matter, since horror movies are not noted for their logic, they also say that are just copying the killer and are not the actual killers ("We're copying a killer that already exists."). Ray and Bobby also came up with a plan to make themselves look like heroes by giving each other stab wounds to indicate they fought her. But, Ray stabs Bobby repeatedly and nearly kills him revealing Ray's motive was because his favorite show The Wayans Bros. had been cancelled.

However, the real Ghostface abruptly turns up and stabs Ray, who collapses on top of Bobby in the Doggy style position. The killer then attacks Cindy, but she successfully subdues him by employing moves copied from The Matrix and kicks him through a window. Nonetheless, Ghostface vanishes before the police arrive.

At the police station, Cindy and the local sheriff (Kurt Fuller) realise that (through a montage similar to that of The Usual Suspects) Doofy - the only one who knew about the car accident - was actually faking his disability and is the true killer . Unfortunately, Doofy has already escaped with Gail Hailstorm. Upon finding his discarded disguise in the street, Cindy begins screaming "Noooooo" to the heavens - and gets run over by a car, presumably killing her (though she returns in the sequel alive and well).

As the credits roll, Shorty - parodying the rules of a trilogy in Scream 3 - explains via videocassette that he may be in prison or deceased, but provides rules for surviving such a situation... which turn out to be instructions for surviving a snatch-and-run.

Cast[link]

Parodies[link]

Much of the humor of Scary Movie relies upon specific references to other contemporary films. Roger Ebert remarked in his review that "to get your money's worth, you need to be familiar with the various teenage horror franchises."^[2] Much of the film's plot is modeled after I Know What You Did Last Summer including the teens' accidental murder of an innocent man on a car ride and Barry's murder onstage.^[2] Several elements are borrowed from the Scream franchise^[2] including the character Ghostface, the attack in the movie theatre as modeled after Scream 2, and the "rules of a trilogy" video from Scream 3. While smoking marijuana, Shorty quips "I see dead people," the line famously spoken by Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense.^[3] In a chase scene, the film shifts its point of view to that of a hand-held camera with the characters speaking directly to the audience as in The Blair Witch Project.^[3] The scene in which Ray is about to stab Bobby to make the police believe they were the victims of the killer borrows heavily from a similar scene that takes place during the climax of Scream.

Many scenes and jokes parody or reference other films outside the horror film genre. The fight between Cindy and the killer heavily mimics The Matrix, particularly its use of bullet time.^[2] The final scene, in which Doofy stops feigning his disability and drives away with Gail, is a takeoff of the final scene of The Usual Suspects.^[3] When asked about her favorite horror movie, Drew answers "Kazaam" due to Shaquille O'Neal's acting.^[2] Cindy becomes aggressive and roars "Say my name!" during sex with Bobby, similar to the sex scene between Michelle and Jim in American Pie.^[3] A trailer for a fictitious sequel to Amistad titled Amistad II appears in the movie theater scene.^[4]

The film also makes other pop culture references beyond the scope of film, including a brief send-up of Dawson's Creek^[5] and a parody of the Whassup? ad campaign by Budweiser.^[5]

Rating[link]

In British Columbia, the film Scary Movie was given an 18A rating by the provincial FCO, but was re-rated on appeal by the Motion Picture and Liquor Appeal Board to a 14A. This resulted in a record number of complaints to the British Columbia Film Classification Office from parents who felt the film should have been rated 18A. Many parents wrote letters to their local newspaper warning others that the film may be inappropriate for their fourteen-year-olds. Theatre owners complained about the inappropriate rating as well.^[6]

[edit] Reception

The film received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, 53% of critics gave the film a positive review based on 109 reviews.^[7]

Joe Leydon of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a positive review, remarking that the film was "unbounded by taste, inhibition or political correctness" and that "the outer limits of R-rated respectability are stretched, if not shredded" by the movie.^[3] By contrast, Roger Ebert did not find the film as innovative, saying that the film lacked "the shocking impact of Airplane!, which had the advantage of breaking new ground."^[2] However, Ebert did give the film 3 stars out of 4, saying it "delivers the goods", calling the film a "raucous, satirical attack on slasher movies."

Bob Longino of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution felt that the film's crude humor detracted from the film, saying that Scary Movie "dives so deep into tasteless humor that it's a wonder it landed an R rating instead of an NC-17."^[8] Other reviewers, such as A.O. Scott of the New York Times, argued that the jokes were "annoying less for their vulgarity than for their tiredness."^[4] Scott remarked in his review, "Couch-bound pot smokers, prison sex, mannish female gym teachers, those Whassssup Budweiser commercials -- hasn't it all been done to death?"^[4]

Soundtrack[link]

A soundtrack containing hip hop and alternative rock songs from the movie was released on July 4, 2000 by TVT Records.

See also[link]

• Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the Thirteenth — A spoof of horror movies
• Student Bodies — A spoof of horror movies
• Stan Helsing — A spoof of horror movies

References[link]

External links[link]

• Scary Movie at the Internet Movie Database
• Scary Movie at AllRovi
• Scary Movie at Box Office Mojo
• Scary Movie at Rotten Tomatoes
• Scary Movie at Metacritic