If there's one true thing about horror movies, it's that success spawns sequels. That's the reason why Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, and Freddy Krueger have appeared in thirty movies combined (counting the remakes). Practically nothing will stop Hollywood from making a sequel to a hit movie, even if it goes straight to video several years after the appropriate window of opportunity.
But most of the time, Hollywood likes to knock out horror sequels quickly. Take, for instance, Scream 2, which was rushed out to theaters one year to the month after the first one. The rush was obvious, as the movie was a wholly mediocre effort. That's probably why Dimension Films waited a few years before making the third (and until a few weeks ago, the final) chapter in the story. Three years passed between Scream 2 and Scream 3, giving its creators plenty of time to hammer out the details. But even then, Scream 3 is still barely adequate.
Welcome to Hollywood, where Stab 3: Return to Woodsboro is about to enter production. It's soon marred, though, by the appearance of a new Ghostface. The masked murderer is not only targeting the cast and crew of Stab 3, but is leaving clues hinting towards a connection with the dearly departed mother of Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell).
Sidney has been living off the grid since we last saw her, using a fake name and working out of her home in the middle of nowhere as an operator for a crisis hotline. But when she hears that the killer's potential ties to her mother, Sidney is forced out of seclusion to confront Ghostface and learn the truth behind some of her family's darkest secrets.
The problem I had with Scream 3 is the same I had with Scream 3: it's just more of the same. It tries harder than the earlier sequel, and the Hollywood aspect makes for some fun parts, but it still doesn't feel like anything I haven't seen before. It's especially bad when you realize just how dumb Scream 3 is. The movie doesn't have a fraction of the intelligence of even the second Scream. There's no brains, precious few scares, and one of the worst "been there, done that" feelings I've gotten from any sequel.
Wes Craven returns yet again to direct what was at the time meant to be the conclusion of the Scream saga. While his work is technically sound, he just doesn't manage to accomplish the same level of fright that he did previously. It's kinda hard for a horror movie to be successful when the viewer can see every scare coming. There isn't any originality to his direction, no spark of creativity. If you've seen the first two movies, then you'll know how Craven approaches Scream 3. He doesn't do all that much differently from what he'd done before, so while it works, it's stale.
But the real problem with Scream 3 is the script by Ehren Kruger. Nope, there's no Kevin Williamson to be found here this time. He was too busy working on multiple projects — including his short-lived TV show Wasteland and his lone directorial effort, Teaching Mrs. Tingle — at the time, and couldn't return for Scream 3, allowing Kruger to step in and fill the void. It's a shame too, because I'd rather have Williamson's mediocre script from Scream 2 than Kruger's crappy one from this movie.
Where it goes wrong is that it's stupid to an unbelievable degree. Why do the police bring in a tabloid television journalist to help them do detective work? Why is Dewey, the actual cop, working as an advisor on Stab 3? I'd expect that from Gale, but not Dewey. And the attempt to squeeze in the cameo from Jamie Kennedy's character from the first two movies is not only preposterous but implausible as well.
Kruger's script doesn't have a fraction of the smarts that Williamson brought to the other Scream movies. The idea of Ghostface attacking the cast of a sequel to a movie based on the events of the first movie is a novel one, but Kruger doesn't do much with it. The characters run around a mockup of Sidney's house on a studio backlot, there's a few snide jokes about the Hollywood filmmaking machine, and that's pretty much it. I will confess to thinking the subplot that sees Gale being shadowed by the actress playing her in Stab 3, both trying to one-up each other in their investigation, is clever. But clever ideas aren't worth much if they aren't executed worth a damn. And the truth is that Kruger simply doesn't quite pull them off.
Even the cast is inconsistent. Take Neve Campbell, for instance. Campbell's been one of the strongest parts of the Scream saga, but her performance here isn't really all that impressive. It's almost like she's doing a parody of herself from the first two movies. All she does is whine about how two massacres have ruined her life, then run from a third killer. I really hate giving her a negative critique, because she's good in the other three movies in the series. But here? She's not good. And in watching the movie, I got the feeling that Campbell's role is a lesser one. Her part comes across as secondary, like she's just another supporting character instead of the lead one she was previously. Maybe that affected Campbell's performance, I don't know. I think Campbell's performance could have been improved had Kruger written Sidney similar to how Ripley was treated in Alien 3: a survivor tired of fighting yet still doing so because that's all she knows anymore. That could have made for a captivating movie, but alas, no such luck.
And that whole "doing a parody of themselves" thing can be said for David Arquette and Courteney Cox too. Arquette gets to play the dopey small-town cop who wants to be a hero and get the girl, and Cox gets to play a stone cold bitch who wants to play detective. It's like they boiled the characters down to their barest (less than bare, even) descriptions and figured, "Why try?" Arquette and Cox are still watchable, but I felt like they weren't as good as they'd been previously. Not only are their parts written badly, but the actors just feel kinda there.
The rest of the cast is sadly forgettable. There are some funny cameos from Kevin Smith and Jason Mewes (who appear as Jay and Silent Bob), Carrie Fisher, and Roger Corman, but outside of that, the supporting cast isn't worth much. The only person who stands out is Parker Posey, who plays the actress playing Gale in Stab 3. And the only reason she stands out is because she's so friggin' annoying. Every single second Posey was on the screen made me want to stop the movie and go do something else instead. And I know she's supposed to be some kind of indie movie darling with something of her own cult following, but I've never seen what the big deal about her was. Sorry, folks, but Posey's never done it for me.
And that pretty much sums up my feelings for Scream 3: it just doesn't do it for me. Of the four movies in the franchise, this one is most definitely the absolute worst of them. If it was really supposed to be the conclusion of the franchise, it's a really crappy way to bring things to a close. The characters are bland, the acting is disappointing, and the direction is just okay at best. And perhaps worst of all, there are no worthwhile scares. You'd think a horror movie would have at least a couple of good scares, but no, not Scream 3. It's just a bad movie. There was so much more they could have done to make this a good movie, but nope, this is what we've got. And that's disappointing.
Final Rating: **
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