Scream is one of my old movies.  I saw it several years ago but the details had grown hazy so I dusted off the DVD to give it another go round.  I’m glad I did.  This Wes Craven classic was one of the first horror movies to rock the critics because it parodies so many other horror films while remaining a scary plot line.  And it’s intelligent.  I liked it so much that I’d watched Scream 2 as well, and the two had jumbled up in my mind.  In case you’re still in a Halloween mood, here’s the basic premise (I won’t spoil the ending): the opening sequence is so well-known that I’m tempted to skip it, but it sets the scene remarkably well.  A teenage girl home alone answers the phone to find a stranger on the line.  This stranger is watching her as he calls, eventually breaking into her house.  Using horror movie clichés, the ghost-faced intruder catches and kills her.

After that, Sidney Prescott is having trouble getting over her mother’s murder the previous year.  The recent murder triggers her.  When her father has to leave town on business, she decides to stay with a friend.  Ghostface attacks her, leading to the arrest of her boyfriend, who shows up after the slasher attack.  Along with her friends, of which the guys are all horror movie fans, she plays out various scenarios of who the killer might, or “should” be, according to the rules of the genre.  This is very effectively done, keeping the first-time viewer guessing who the killer might be.  When school is suspended because of the killings, the kids have a massive party (of course).  The killer’s there, however, for the most part following the rules.  But the instructions are subverted, making for a wild ride.

Clever and satirical, the movie strikes the right tone.  One thing I noticed the first time was that Ghostface is a little too fast for a psychotic killer.  He runs.  He’s also quite vulnerable, but then again, he’s not a supernatural villain.  After seeing Scream again, I realized that there are still some classics that I’ve missed.  One reason is that I’m not really a slasher fan.  Throughout the movie they avoid using the word “horror,” preferring “scary movie”—the original title for the film.  Scary Movie was picked up by a horror parody that I watched shortly after seeing Scream for the first time.  In many ways Scary Movie is a parody of a parody.  Horror is endlessly self-referential, of course.  And sometime an old movie is just what you need.