[00:00:06] Speaker A: Welcome to Five Minute Film Finder, brought to you by Pioneer Library System.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: Hello, and welcome to Five Minute Film Finder. My name is Samuel, and today I'm joined by
[00:00:17] Speaker C: Tracy.
[00:00:18] Speaker B: Yes. And today we're doing a deep focus episode where we dive in on just one film.
And to set this up, Tracy, I have one question for you.
[00:00:28] Speaker C: Oh, perfect. Oh, I bet I know what it is.
[00:00:30] Speaker B: What's your favorite scary movie?
[00:00:33] Speaker C: It's hello, Mary Lou from I do.
[00:00:35] Speaker B: We are not talking about that.
[00:00:38] Speaker C: We're not. Cause I've already covered that on this podcast.
[00:00:44] Speaker B: We are talking about if that wasn't a dead giveaway, Scream 1996, which can be found on Kanopy.
[00:00:51] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:00:53] Speaker B: It's perfect, because this is the 30th anniversary of Scream. It
[00:00:56] Speaker C: is, yeah. 1996. 2026.
[00:00:58] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So really auspicious moment to be covering this film. If you haven't been to a 30th anniversary screening.
Run, don't walk. To where they are happening. To where they're happening.
What is your relationship to Scream?
[00:01:13] Speaker C: I watched it for the first time, maybe I'm gonna say, like, five or so years ago, we were talking about our sort of intro into horror. And you and I, it sounds like both started pretty late in life. So I started getting interested in horror in, like, my mid-20s. I am nearing closer to my mid-30s every day, so it's been less than 10 years of me being really into horror films. When was your, like, introduction into horror
[00:01:39] Speaker B: films about a similar timeline? Mid-20s. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:01:42] Speaker C: So the first time I watched Scream was probably five years ago, but I think I've been aware of Scream for my entire life.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: Okay. Like,
[00:01:50] Speaker C: Ghostface has been such, like, a.
Just, like a visual for every Halloween
[00:01:56] Speaker B: that
[00:01:56] Speaker C: I have any memory of.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:01:58] Speaker C: You know what I mean?
[00:01:59] Speaker B: A horrifying visual, at least for me as a kid.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I first watched it three years ago, and then I decided that that was gonna become my whole cinematic personality.
[00:02:12] Speaker C: What? Scream?
[00:02:14] Speaker B: Yeah, Scream. Scream.
What was kind of crazy. I watched it and I was like, this is the craziest thing I've ever seen. Yeah, this is incredible. And then, luckily, was right. I think that was the year Scream VI came out.
[00:02:28] Speaker C: Oh, okay.
[00:02:29] Speaker B: And so me and my buddy friend of the pod, I guess, I don't know if he's ever listened to an episode. Philip watched the entire Scream series. Oh. So he
[00:02:39] Speaker C: went through everything.
[00:02:40] Speaker B: We went through everything. Oh, my gosh. Amazing. Gosh. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm a huge Scream fan.
[00:02:44] Speaker C: Okay. So But I will say, if you watch Scream, and that's like one of the first horror movies you saw, have you. As you've watched more and have gone back and watched it, have the references made more sense? Because for anyone who hasn't seen Scream, it is super referential of 1970s and 80s horror slashers, largely of the creator of Screeb and Nightmare on Elm Street, Wes
[00:03:09] Speaker B: Graven. Wes Graven, Yeah.
Yeah. It's one of those things where, when I first saw it, I think a lot of references just did not land. But I think that's a testament to how
[00:03:19] Speaker C: good of
[00:03:20] Speaker B: a movie is.
And slashers, they kind of have.
They've kind of seeped into pop culture in a way that you kind of get it. Maybe you've seen someone spoof them before. And so it was interesting to see in 1996 someone kind of doing the spoofing, but in maybe not as openly satirical of a way, I guess. Like, it's not. It's not Scary Movie levels of spoof.
[00:03:45] Speaker C: So it's funny that you.
Because. Do you know what the original title of the script was?
[00:03:50] Speaker B: Yes, it was Scary Movie. Scary Movie.
[00:03:53] Speaker C: Because it was written by Kevin Williamson, actually, who originally titled it Scary Movie and had it. Do you know what else Kevin Williamson has written or directed? I have a little list here because I think it's kind of fun.
[00:04:05] Speaker B: I know a fair.
I'll say. I know a little bit.
[00:04:09] Speaker C: I
[00:04:09] Speaker B: know Dawson's Creek.
[00:04:10] Speaker C: He did Dawson's Creek. Yes, he did. I Know what yout Did Last Summer.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah.
[00:04:14] Speaker C: He did the Faculty, which is a super, super popular kind of cult horror film.
And then he also did the Vampire Diaries television program.
So he's had a wide array of.
Putting teenagers on screen.
[00:04:29] Speaker B: Yes, yes, yes.
That's kind of like where his sweet spot is. Just like the kind of.
Oh, this is embarrassing. I have totally forgotten the 80s teen director.
He did a bunch of, like, the teen romance.
[00:04:49] Speaker A: John Hughes.
[00:04:49] Speaker B: John Hughes. John Hughes, yeah. Yeah. Obviously not my preferred genre of film, but unfortunately. Sorry to confess on the pod, but.
[00:04:57] Speaker C: Well, we're gonna fix it.
[00:04:59] Speaker B: But like John Hughes, if he was like, a little twisted, maybe
[00:05:02] Speaker C: a little more twisted. Yeah. And so they apparently had to kind of convince Wes Craven to take this film on, because Wes Craven did the Hills have Eyes, he did the original Nightmare on Elm Street. He's done several other not nearly as popular horror films, and he was. I think he'd maybe just done New Nightmare before this.
[00:05:21] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:05:23] Speaker C: Which do you know about New Nightmare?
[00:05:25] Speaker B: No.
[00:05:25] Speaker C: Okay. So Wes Craven's new nightmare is Wes Craven going in and doing essentially what Scream 3 does. So anyone who Scream 3 is a movie about the making of a movie about screaming.
And Wes Craven's new nightmare is they're going to remake Nightmare on Elm street. And the hero of it is Heather Landicamp, who is the actress from the original Nightmare on Elm Street. Oh,
[00:05:47] Speaker B: wow.
[00:05:47] Speaker C: Who comes back as herself and is being hunted by Freddy. Yeah.
[00:05:52] Speaker B: Okay,
[00:05:53] Speaker C: so he loves to spoof on his own work.
[00:05:56] Speaker B: Well, isn't that interesting? Because in Scream 3, the director, Roman, he's complaining the whole time because he wants to make a romance film. Right.
Which I think is kind of what Wes. He wanted to go out and do, like a dramatic movie.
[00:06:10] Speaker C: Yeah. But he's too good at making horror films.
[00:06:13] Speaker B: He is. Yeah, he is. I mean, he's pretty. Pretty good. Pretty good.
[00:06:16] Speaker C: He's pretty great at it. And this is pretty. Do you want to get a little bit more into the meat of this one?
[00:06:19] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, let's do it. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:06:21] Speaker C: Okay, so this is your. One of your favorite movies. Where do you want to start?
[00:06:25] Speaker B: I mean. Well, let's start from the beginning. Right,
[00:06:27] Speaker C: right.
[00:06:29] Speaker B: I'm just going to assume after 30 years, even though I'm a genre,
[00:06:34] Speaker C: this is a spoiler full conversation.
[00:06:35] Speaker B: Yes, yes.
Well, it's just great because it opens with Drew Barrymore, right? Yes. As Casey Becker. And you think, again, the tropes are coming and it's like, okay, this is the final girl, Right. This is the Jamie Lee Curtis of Scream. And she's all plastered on the promotional material.
[00:06:54] Speaker C: She's on the poster twice.
[00:06:56] Speaker B: Yes, yes.
[00:06:57] Speaker C: It's her face in the background and she's one of the people in the front.
[00:07:01] Speaker B: Yeah. And I just found out, Jamie, one of the hosts on the podcast, she recommended your favorite scary movie, the book about the making of Scream. Have you read it?
[00:07:11] Speaker C: No, but I want to.
[00:07:12] Speaker B: Okay. Okay. Well, I didn't know this. It was Drew Barrymore's idea to make her Casey Becker.
[00:07:17] Speaker C: Yes. She was originally cast as Sidney, the main character. The Neve Campbell role.
[00:07:22] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And so, spoiler alert. She's not the final girl.
[00:07:25] Speaker C: No. She's the first girl to die, in fact.
[00:07:28] Speaker B: Yes, yes. And it happens straight out of the get go. And I remember when I first watched it, I thought. Because I think there's just. There are a couple moments where you think she's just gonna get away. Mm.
[00:07:37] Speaker C: Well, she does. I think what's fun about this movie and what's so great about it is that as the characters in this movie do everything that characters in horror movies, when you're screaming at a horror movie, like, don't do that. Like, don't go out. They're doing everything that you would do. Honestly, the one breaking the most rules is Sidney, who ends up being our main character.
But everything that Drew Barrymore is doing, and you know, she's saying, like, my boyfriend's supposed to be here. I'm gonna call the cops. She gets a knife. She, like, is ready to attack this person who's coming after her. And then it's even people show up. Near the end of her being attacked, her parents show up back home in the middle of this horrible, brutal scene. She does all this stuff to try to get attention and she still dies.
[00:08:23] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah,
[00:08:24] Speaker C: yeah. And it's. If you have never seen this film before, super shocking.
[00:08:29] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah,
[00:08:30] Speaker C: yeah. Because it's.
I mean, it's very violent. And the whole phone call thing is very reminiscent of Black Christmas. I don't know if you've ever seen that
[00:08:41] Speaker B: incredible, great,
[00:08:43] Speaker C: perfect film.
[00:08:45] Speaker B: No notes.
[00:08:46] Speaker C: But also the thing that's fun about it and one of the things that I was reading up on a little bit about the movie is that the guy who does the voice acting, his name is Roger L. Jackson.
I guess the reason they ended up keeping him on as a voice of it is because he played it so different than other people because he kind of does try to be sort of seductive. Like, there is something very jovial and very fun about him as opposed to just being like, mouth breather scary, like kind of wet. Black Christmas is just like, I'm gonna get you, you know, kind of thing. I'm never doing that again.
I hated every second of that. And I'm sorry anyone who's listening to this also had to hear that.
But the voice acting that he does is like, it really. You can understand why someone would stay on the phone with him a little bit when you're like, it's 1996, you're bored. You're about to. You're making popcorn and you're like, sure, I'll talk to this guy on the phone for five minutes.
[00:09:41] Speaker B: Yeah,
[00:09:41] Speaker C: it's great.
[00:09:42] Speaker B: It is interesting.
One of the times I saw it this year, a friend of mine was like, yeah, just hang up the phone.
It is hard to imagine a world in which, like, the phone is like the main outlet outside of your home. Yeah. With the ubiquity of the Internet. But yeah, I was like, okay, like, you answered the phone, because that'd be like, someone knocking on your door, and you're just like, I'm not gonna answer that.
[00:10:10] Speaker C: Yeah. Because, like, in 1996, caller ID wasn't that popular yet.
[00:10:15] Speaker B: Like,
[00:10:15] Speaker C: it's not so crazy that someone would be like, I have no clue who's calling me, so I'm gonna pick up the phone. And in a lot of situations where someone is picking up the phone for Drew Barrymore in the first scene, and then for Sidney, Neve Campbell, and several of the other scenes, your parents are out of the house and they're like 16 years old, you gotta pick up the phone.
[00:10:34] Speaker B: Yeah. It's like there was almost like, the expectation you have to make sure the house runs, you know, when we're out. Like latchkey kids. Right. Very.
[00:10:44] Speaker C: That. So I think when you go in with that context, it makes it a lot easier to be like, well, why would you pick up the phone in the first place? Cause your mom might be calling and you have no way to tell. But it's not your mom.
[00:10:55] Speaker B: Yeah. It's Ghostface. It's Ghostface. It's
[00:10:57] Speaker C: Ghostface, unfortunately. Yeah.
[00:10:58] Speaker B: And he ends up.
He's very successful at what he does. Yes,
[00:11:02] Speaker C: unfortunately, he murders her boyfriend and her quite brutally.
[00:11:09] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:11:09] Speaker C: And then we hop into
[00:11:12] Speaker B: a teen high school movie.
[00:11:14] Speaker C: The next sunny day at a California high school.
[00:11:19] Speaker B: Yeah. And this is where we get introduced to kind of like the main cast. Right. You have Sidney, you have Randy, who's kind of the movie nerd.
[00:11:27] Speaker C: Yeah. Randy, played by Jamie Kennedy, who is perfect in this movie.
[00:11:31] Speaker B: Perfect. Okay, great.
[00:11:32] Speaker C: I love him.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: Okay. Okay.
[00:11:34] Speaker C: It's because I, unfortunately, am him.
[00:11:36] Speaker B: Okay.
You might be a little bit different.
[00:11:40] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:42] Speaker B: Okay. I'm not gonna tell too many tales out of school here, but there is someone who works at Pioneer who has worked with him before.
[00:11:49] Speaker C: Oh, yeah,
[00:11:50] Speaker B: yeah, yeah. So, okay, so Scream is just interwoven with Pioneer library
[00:11:55] Speaker C: system.
We're going to start telling people that and see how that goes.
[00:12:03] Speaker B: The other cast of characters. So Tatum. Right. Like, Tatum,
[00:12:07] Speaker C: played by Rose McGowan, who is also perfect.
[00:12:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
Okay.
It might be worth just. She's great in this movie.
[00:12:17] Speaker C: She's so good.
[00:12:18] Speaker B: She's like a great, like, best friend. Right. Like, she, like, gases up her friend after she punches Courtney Cox, which is
[00:12:29] Speaker C: amazing.
[00:12:29] Speaker B: Which is like, I don't know anything about throwing a punch or boxing, but to my untrained eye, that looked like a really good punch.
Like, I've seen a lot of, like, pro athletes in, like, baseball and stuff, like, throw punches, and it. It doesn't look Nearly as real
[00:12:48] Speaker C: as Neve. Well, that's cause Neve Campbell is a really good actress. Yes.
And Courteney Cox plays a news reporter who is reporting both on the murders that are happening in town at the time, but also on the murder of Sidney's mother, which happened roughly a year before the events of the film and is kind of written a pretty. It sounds like pretty trashy sounding tell all book that's going
[00:13:10] Speaker B: to
[00:13:10] Speaker C: be coming out about Sidney's mother's murder. So Sidney does punch Courtney Cox in good faith
[00:13:17] Speaker B: is
[00:13:17] Speaker C: what I will say.
[00:13:18] Speaker B: Yeah. Because I mean, this was like kind of like the height of that sort of, I don't know, like that kind of news cycle of like the descent into like trashy news cycles and stuff and not concerned about, say, responsible or reporting or even journalistic ethics, I guess.
[00:13:34] Speaker C: Courteney Cox is also great in this movie.
[00:13:36] Speaker B: Yes, yes.
Playing Gale Weathers. Did we say Gale Weathers?
[00:13:40] Speaker C: Yes. Which
[00:13:41] Speaker B: is such a funny name.
[00:13:42] Speaker C: Yep. And then the other high school kids that we deal with are Matthew Lillard as Tatum's boyfriend, who is also perfect in this movie.
[00:13:54] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:13:54] Speaker C: And then Skeet Ulrich as
[00:13:57] Speaker B: Billy Loomis.
[00:13:57] Speaker C: Billy Loomis, who is Sidney's boyfriend, who is also doing a great Johnny Depp impression in
[00:14:05] Speaker B: this film.
That's true. That's true.
[00:14:08] Speaker C: So have you seen the original Nightmare on Elm Street?
[00:14:10] Speaker B: I just saw it for the first time this year. So,
[00:14:12] Speaker C: you know, Johnny Depp is also in that movie. And it's very funny that it sort of feels like Wes Craven was like, let's get a Johnny Depp type. And then they were like, here's Skeet Ulrich right here. And he was like, perfect.
[00:14:23] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:14:24] Speaker C: Cause he's the sad eyes, just like he's got like that real, like the one hair just out of place. Like it's so 1980s Johnny Depp coded. Just like every time I watch this movie, I'm like, wow, he just really likes to cast man who look like Johnny
[00:14:43] Speaker B: Depp. Yeah. Yeah.
I would like to say, though, I feel like Sidney.
And maybe this is to your point about. She breaks all the rules.
[00:14:52] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:14:53] Speaker B: She runs past so many red flags.
[00:14:56] Speaker C: Oh, my God.
[00:14:57] Speaker B: So many.
[00:14:58] Speaker C: Just picking them up. Spoiler
[00:15:00] Speaker B: alert. Billy Loomis is Ghostface.
[00:15:02] Speaker C: Well, Billy Loomis and Stu
[00:15:04] Speaker B: Motto,
[00:15:04] Speaker C: which is Matthew Lillard.
[00:15:06] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:15:06] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:15:08] Speaker B: Just. Well, okay, first thing, he like, sneaks into her bedroom.
[00:15:13] Speaker C: Yep.
[00:15:15] Speaker B: And what does he say? I was watching the Exorcist and
[00:15:17] Speaker C: it made me think
[00:15:18] Speaker B: of you.
[00:15:20] Speaker C: Romance is a dead lady.
But here's the thing when you've got. When you're a teenage girl and some guy, you're like, oh, that's intriguing.
[00:15:29] Speaker B: She's thinking about me.
Okay. Yeah.
[00:15:33] Speaker C: No, he's the worst.
[00:15:34] Speaker B: He's the worst. He's the worst.
I'm sorry. I was committed to coming in here and like, let's just follow the plot. But we
[00:15:41] Speaker C: don't have to because like we've said, we think most people have seen this movie.
It's a truly iconoclast of horror films.
[00:15:49] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, That's. Yeah.
The scene where he's like, get over your mom dying is just.
[00:15:57] Speaker C: I almost threw something at my television. I've seen this movie three or four times before.
I was just like, shut.
[00:16:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
Yeah.
And okay, so I'm of two minds of this.
[00:16:09] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:11] Speaker B: I mean, knowing that he's like a killer. Right. And he's. He probably has some sort of psychosis going on. But. But there's a part of me that's like, this is so ridiculous. Like, no one would ever say that to someone.
[00:16:21] Speaker C: No.
[00:16:22] Speaker B: After they lost their mom. But then I think about it and I'm like, actually, I could see a high school kid saying something stupid like this.
[00:16:29] Speaker C: Oh, I was a horrible teenager.
[00:16:30] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:16:32] Speaker C: And I can definitely imagine a world where I was like, why don't you just get over it to someone?
[00:16:37] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:16:40] Speaker C: Cause empathy is hard to form.
[00:16:42] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah, no, that's true. Right? Like, there's like. When you're a child, you are.
So much of your life is kind of self centered and it makes sense because you're in many ways, you're like at a vulnerable stage of life when you're trying to survive.
[00:16:54] Speaker C: Yes, but he is also a psychopath.
[00:16:56] Speaker B: He is also a psychopath. So I shouldn't be carrying water right now. But also, it's just.
[00:17:01] Speaker C: No, it's okay. I understand.
He's terrible, but he is hot.
And this was a teen movie. And so that's kind of somehow how those goes. It's the same thing with a movie that I know that you have now maybe not seen, which is Pretty in Pink, which is.
[00:17:19] Speaker B: I maybe have seen that. I'm not sure
[00:17:21] Speaker C: the guy she ends up with is not really that good of a guy, but he is very good looking.
[00:17:26] Speaker B: And that's the lesson from this, folks,
[00:17:30] Speaker C: that can be important in teen cinema. And it is here, and it makes a lot of sense. And it's one of the things that they actually do talk about a lot in the movie is Tatum is constantly like, oh, at one point, when they first think that Billy might have been the person who attacked her, at one point, Sidney is at home and she gets attacked by Ghostface.
And this is one of the first times where she breaks all the rules, where she is on the telephone with him and he's like, I'm on your porch. And she's like, no, you're not.
[00:17:57] Speaker B: She just
[00:17:57] Speaker C: goes out there and he's not there. She is. Correct, but you shouldn't do that.
But then he. He does attack her. And Billy's in her house and drops a cell phone. She's pretty sure it's him.
Tatum comes to get her at the police station with her brother Dewey, who is a deputy at the police station, who is played by David Arquette.
[00:18:16] Speaker B: Wonderful.
[00:18:16] Speaker C: Perfectly.
[00:18:18] Speaker B: He's a fan favorite character. Everyone in this
[00:18:20] Speaker C: movie is doing some of their best work. It's wonderful to be around.
Tatum says, I knew there had to be something wrong with him.
[00:18:28] Speaker B: Have you just heard him talk? I don't know.
[00:18:30] Speaker C: Tatum. She's like, he's so. He's like so attentive to her. They've been together for like two years. And she's like, there had to be something wrong with
[00:18:36] Speaker B: him.
[00:18:37] Speaker C: He wanted to kill you. And one of our classmates, you know, just like,
[00:18:42] Speaker B: just. Yeah, you know. What a crazy thing to say to your friend.
They just survived being attacked.
[00:18:48] Speaker C: I knew there had to be something wrong with your boyfriend.
This movie's great.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, it's.
It really is. If you haven't watched it, watch it. It's really good.
But, yeah, you get. I don't know, it's just. It's funny.
[00:19:04] Speaker C: There are a lot of jokes in it. Do you want to skip forward to what I think is probably the most important part, which is the 42 minute final house party scene in this film, because I think we need to get into that.
[00:19:15] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:19:16] Speaker C: So. So.
[00:19:16] Speaker B: But real quick, go
[00:19:17] Speaker C: ahead.
[00:19:17] Speaker B: I just want to say I love the Dewey ice cream scene with the sheriff. Oh,
[00:19:22] Speaker C: that's so funny.
[00:19:23] Speaker B: Because he's the deputy. He's kind of played to be kind of like. He's still like an overgrown manchild and he's trying to be a serious man. And the sheriff is there, smoking, confronting the reality of the savagery of this movie.
And Dewey's there with his little ice cream cone. Sheriff takes a drag. Cut to Dewey licking the
[00:19:42] Speaker C: ice cream cone.
And there is. Yeah. And then the sheriff throws down his cigarette. And I'm like, is Dewey gonna throw down his ice cream? He doesn't. But it would have been so funny. It would have
[00:19:51] Speaker B: been
[00:19:51] Speaker C: funny. The other shout out that I want to do for this is that there is some time spent in the school sort of establishing sort of what's going on. And Sidney does also get attacked in the school, which causes the school to get shut down. And the school principal is played by Henry Winkler.
[00:20:04] Speaker B: Yes, yes. Who
[00:20:05] Speaker C: is also doing the Lord's work in this film.
[00:20:10] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:20:11] Speaker C: He is so funny. There's at one point where Sidney's like being talked to by the police and he like very gently grabs her face and you're like, don't do that, don't do that. And then two of the guys who are running around in the Ghostface costume, like, he's like expels them and gives them this whole speech. And then at one point he's in the school and he walks out and the janitor is frozen fully dressed like Freddy Krueger. And it is Wes Craven.
It's just like all of that stuff is so funny and so good. But it does get to the meat of this movie, which is they get put out of school because of these attacks. They decide to have this house party.
[00:20:50] Speaker B: That's two mockers. Yes.
[00:20:52] Speaker C: This is a 42 minute final scene of the film that apparently took like multiple weeks to film of just. This is where the murdering really kind of kicks off.
[00:21:02] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:21:03] Speaker C: And this is where Jamie Kennedy's character is there. He works at the video store. He brings Halloween for them to watch. And he outlines the three most important rules of how to survive a horror film. Which probably if you know these.
Don't have sex, don't do drugs or drink alcohol.
Never say, I'll be right back.
[00:21:25] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Which Stu Macher then says, I'll be right back.
Which is pretty nasty work if you know you're the killer, you know. But
[00:21:35] Speaker C: yeah,
[00:21:37] Speaker B: they should have known then. They should have known then.
[00:21:40] Speaker C: And we go through a variety of sort of people getting killed and these sort of fakes of who's going on. Dewey is outside of the party and then at one point he's inside of the party. Gale Weathers plants a camera inside of the party, but there's a 30 second delay on the camera. And so her and her cameraman are watching everything that's happening inside of this party, most of which is not that interesting until people start getting murdered.
[00:22:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:22:10] Speaker C: So there are. The big kill, I would say, of this part is the Tatum.
[00:22:16] Speaker B: Yes. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:22:17] Speaker C: Which is
[00:22:20] Speaker B: again, I think her performance in this scene is great. Her
[00:22:22] Speaker C: performance in the whole movie is amazing.
[00:22:24] Speaker B: Yeah. But I love the sort of like the fake, like, ooh, I want to be in the sequel. And I think her playing kind of like the sarcastic high school kid is just great in that scene.
[00:22:36] Speaker C: She's amazing
[00:22:38] Speaker B: and she should be on an MLB pitching staff the way she nails Ghostface with those queer bottles.
[00:22:44] Speaker C: Yeah, she totally. But then she tries to crawl out through the cat door that's in the garage and he just raises the garage door on her and she's dead.
[00:22:59] Speaker B: Yes. It's pretty gruesome kill.
[00:23:01] Speaker C: No one looks for her for 30 whole minutes of the movie.
[00:23:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
Sidney doesn't discover until Sidney jumps out of a second story window or falls out onto a boat. And then she gets off of the boat. Perfectly placed boat. And then she looks and there's her friend broken into.
[00:23:21] Speaker C: Several minutes of the film is fast. And several things have come up before. This is. So Billy wasn't invited to the party. Billy shows up at the party. She and Billy break rule number one, which is that she has sex with him. And so then you know that she's open to all of these issues in the film.
[00:23:40] Speaker B: People leave the party.
[00:23:41] Speaker C: Horror movie people leave the party because they find out that the principal's been murdered and I think is like on the high school football field or
[00:23:48] Speaker B: something. So they all
[00:23:49] Speaker C: leave. So. So it ends up getting down to just the news crew.
Dewey, Jamie Kennedy.
Honestly, Stu, Matthew Lillard has disappeared at this point and has gone off somewhere. We have no clue where he is.
And Ghostface comes in and stabs Billy.
[00:24:11] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:24:11] Speaker C: So we think Billy is dead.
[00:24:13] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:24:13] Speaker C: That is when Sidney falls out of the window.
[00:24:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:24:16] Speaker C: And finds out that Tatum is there.
[00:24:19] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:24:19] Speaker C: She runs off to find Kenny, the guy who's the cameraman for filming it. Gale, Weathers and Dewey have gone off and find Sidney's dad's car. And they are totally trying to frame it to where Sidney's father is the killer. Maybe as this whole cover up for he murdered his wife because it turns out she's been cheating on him. And so it's the year anniversary. He's had this breakdown and all this stuff. So they're all gone. Ghostface comes.
What, like slashes the neck of the camera guy, puts him on top of the car. Because
[00:25:00] Speaker B: of that 30 second delay,
[00:25:02] Speaker C: Jamie Kennedy somehow avoids any of this.
He's just watching Halloween.
Nothing's going to happen.
[00:25:11] Speaker B: Just watch movies, kids. That's how you survive
[00:25:14] Speaker C: will keep you safe because you'll know all of the rules.
Everyone is just the complication of this end scene where Sidney ends up back in the house.
Dewey gets stabbed. Gale Weathers crashed the van, but wakes up and shows back up. As we see Billy is stumbling down the stairs, and it turns out that he never got stabbed. He is just covered in fake corn syrup blood.
And this was all staged by him and Stu.
[00:25:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:25:58] Speaker C: And he says the iconic line from Psycho, which is everyone goes a little mad sometimes.
And we get the iconic line from Scream where she's trying to ask them why they're like this, and they're just quoting all these horror movies at her.
[00:26:16] Speaker B: And
[00:26:16] Speaker C: she's like, why?
You guys have watched one too many movies, and it's.
Movies don't make psychos. That just make psychos more creative.
[00:26:26] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah.
Yeah, it's okay. So this final set piece is incredible. I think it's a real testament to Kevin Williamson's writing one, because, you know. Yeah, you have.
You have those. And I think this was at a height of, like, people were worried about violence among youth in the 90s, obviously.
And what are the causes? And I think sometimes media was a big reason.
[00:26:56] Speaker C: The way video games is definitely a scapegoat for a lot of that now. Yes.
[00:26:59] Speaker B: It's
[00:27:00] Speaker C: movies, rock music, video games. Just pick your poison.
[00:27:04] Speaker B: Yeah. And I think he plays on those, like, tropes kind of brilliantly and also kind of, like, shows how, like, ridiculous they are. Kind of paper thin they are, but. But then also, like, to navigate the timeline. And the spatial aspect of this final set piece is incredible.
[00:27:21] Speaker C: It's so brilliant. Just the way people move through the house and the way that it would have to line up for, like, which one. It would have to be two of them. When you think of, like. And I think in a worse movie that he would not have made the plan of, like, it have to be two people to cause this much destruction. Because if you're watching something like, I mean, so in Nightmare on Elm street, you know, Freddy is magical, but in something, say, like, the first, like, Halloween, Michael Myers isn't magical. Or at least not to start. Or in something like Friday the 13th where, like, Jason Voorhees doesn't start out magical. You know, it's just a person.
And it seems impossible that one person could be in all of these places at once in these classic slasher films where they're trying to posit, like, yup, it's just one guy, and he's, like, the fastest man who ever lived with a knife. And this. It was, I think, really smart of Kevin Williamson to be, like, One person could not do all of these things. It would have to be
[00:28:21] Speaker B: two.
[00:28:21] Speaker C: Two people teaming up to kind of cause all of this mass destruction in hysteria.
[00:28:27] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm trying to remember back to the first time I saw it. I remember, like, my jaw dropping with the reveal. And I do wonder, because you kind of have to know it's two. Once Billy Loomis is revealed to be the killer because
[00:28:41] Speaker C: he's
[00:28:41] Speaker B: fake killed. Yeah.
But I think even then, like, there's a. You know, I don't know, the amnesia of just watching a film. Right. You forget details. They drop out. And when Stu comes in, you're like, oh, my word. But then this is gonna be Stu. How does Stu and Sidney get out of this? Then you're like, oh, no.
[00:29:02] Speaker C: I think that Matthew Lillard did such a good job throughout the film of being such a massive. Kind of, like, he's a creep in the way that. Where you were. Like, if you were a teenager, you'd be like, oh, he's just kind of gross.
But, like, there's that one scene where they're talking to Jamie Kennedy in the film in the video store, and he's, like, gently playing with his earlobe. And you're like, what sort of nightmare person are you?
Like, of course you're a murderer. You keep invading people's space constantly and going, like, licking them and stuff. He's so good at this.
[00:29:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:35] Speaker C: I love Matthew Lillard.
[00:29:38] Speaker B: No, he's. Yeah, yeah. Quentin Tarantino can, you know, kick rocks.
[00:29:43] Speaker C: We love Matthew Lillard.
[00:29:45] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
Just. And, yeah. The whole. Well, and then, like, I think he improvised the line of, my mom and dad are gonna be so mad. Gonna
[00:29:55] Speaker C: be so mad at me. Yeah. So funny. And he's. Well, the other. It's not improvised, but such a funny scene in this film is she's trying to get them to admit why they did it. You know, they're trying to say, it's the millennium. There's no motive, you know, Y2K. Crazy, scary.
Billy ends up admitting that it's because he's pretty sure his dad was cheating with her mom.
[00:30:15] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:16] Speaker C: And his mom left, and she's on the phone with Stu at one point, and she's like, what's your excuse? And he goes, peer pressure. I'm very sensitive.
It's just like, peer pressure made you murder. Like, it turns out her mom. Yeah.
Two of your classmates, your principal, your girlfriend, the cameraman. Just like. Yeah. It's like, that's not peer pressure.
You're crazy.
[00:30:45] Speaker B: Yeah. You just wanted to do you
[00:30:46] Speaker C: just wanted to murder a bunch of people?
[00:30:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Geez. Yeah. Yeah. It's so funny how his character at the end kind of like becomes this kind of like less menacing in a way. Right. Because it's like. It's weird because, like, Billy feels cold blooded in a way. Stu does
[00:31:08] Speaker C: it. Well, I think there's a read of this, and I think it's a pretty popular Internet read. And I think in a way, Kevin Williamson has also agreed on it, that it does feel like there is some sort of unrequited love between them. Yeah. Billy is maybe the ringleader, but Stu is maybe in love with him and is kind of following along with him like a puppy dog, you know? And he did it because he wants to make Billy happy.
[00:31:27] Speaker B: That's interesting. Yeah. Because I know Kevin from the book, your favorite scary movie. I know Kevin Williamson has talked about how he kind of like sees the Scream movies as a little gay and Kevin Williamson himself is gay. And.
And so it's interesting that then like. Okay, so he's kind of seeing this, like, Billy Stu dynamic as more romantic, which was not my initial read, but you can see it. Oh,
[00:31:54] Speaker C: for sure. Yeah.
[00:31:55] Speaker B: Well, and then like, I guess like slashers themselves kind of play around, sort of like the linkage of violence and sexuality. Sexuality,
[00:32:06] Speaker C: absolutely.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: And
[00:32:07] Speaker C: this movie does too. And you wouldn't just stab anyone. You'd only agree to simultaneously stab someone. You
[00:32:13] Speaker B: have to really. You
[00:32:14] Speaker C: have to really love someone to agree to miss all of your vital organs.
[00:32:16] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. You have to really trust someone.
That's why when I go in for surgery, I'm like, only my wife can operate on me.
[00:32:27] Speaker C: That's a lot of pressure about a Rosemary.
[00:32:29] Speaker B: I shouldn't do that. I'm sorry, Rosemary.
[00:32:35] Speaker C: Oh, that was a fun little aside.
[00:32:37] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:32:40] Speaker C: But essentially, yeah, it turns out that they were going to frame her dad. It's the two of them. They sort of.
There are multiple kind of plays here at the end, I think probably the best. I mean, Gale Weathers wakes up, takes on the guys.
[00:32:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:32:57] Speaker C: But the kind of real final scene of this movie is Gale Weathers.
Jamie Kennedy and Sidney are standing above Billy's body.
[00:33:08] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:08] Speaker C: And Jamie Kennedy is like. This is the scene where the killer gets one last chance to kind of. And he. Of course, that's what happens. He wakes up and screams. And she just has a gun. Shoots in between the eyes. No remorse, no anything. Here's the scream theme. That scream.
[00:33:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:28] Speaker C: Yeah,
[00:33:28] Speaker B: yeah. It's really good. Yeah. Yeah, it's really
[00:33:31] Speaker C: good.
[00:33:31] Speaker B: Yeah. And I think, like, I will say to folks like, you don't have to be well versed in slashers, because I think it's a good movie in and of itself and it kind of invites you into the genre.
[00:33:44] Speaker C: It's a really good intro for something that is also so knowledgeable about. Because I think sometimes you can watch something that's a parody, like Scary Movie, and if you don't get all the references, you're gonna be kind of lost in it.
[00:34:00] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:01] Speaker C: And this is a.
Maybe more of an homage than it is a parody.
[00:34:06] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:06] Speaker C: Where it's, like taking all these little bits of this thing that it obviously loves, making fun of the way that sort of become rote or familiar maybe, and then just really twisting the knife enough to, like, if you know all that stuff, then there's like, an extra layer of, like, meta humor in there. But also, if you don't, it's got actors doing incredible work, both in the horror genre and as comedy. It's got, like, really good commentary about just, like, teenage violence and violence in general and the way that we treat people who have gone through these, like, horrific situations. It's just a really, really smart movie.
[00:34:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:49] Speaker C: That doesn't act like it's a smart movie.
[00:34:53] Speaker B: Yeah,
[00:34:53] Speaker C: Yeah,
[00:34:53] Speaker B: I think that's right. Yeah.
And it revived the genre of slashers, for sure. They were kind of like. They were kind of dead at that point. And this really rejuvenated them a bit.
[00:35:04] Speaker C: Absolutely. And has managed to, in a way, maybe become the thing that it was once making fun of. Like, there's an argument there. I've only ever seen up to Scream 2. I'll be so honest with you.
[00:35:15] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:35:16] Speaker C: Scream 2. Also great stars. One of my favorite actors, Timothy Olyphant.
[00:35:22] Speaker B: Scream 2 is also on Canopy, as is Scream 3.
[00:35:24] Speaker C: Oh, great. So the. And that original trilogy was what was planned. Yes. And then we have. Because we like money in the horror genre, and it makes money.
[00:35:32] Speaker B: Here's what I will say.
And I think this is, like.
This might be a common refrain on the Internet, but pound for pound, Scream might be the best of these franchises in terms of each entry, the quality. Right.
Well, we were talking beforehand, like, Halloween. I love the 1978 Halloween.
So many of the other Halloween movies are just terrible.
Friday the 13th starts as a terrible. Like, the first one is terrible.
[00:36:01] Speaker C: How dare you?
[00:36:02] Speaker B: I'm sorry, Tracy.
[00:36:04] Speaker C: How very dare you.
[00:36:05] Speaker B: And it just stays there. How
[00:36:07] Speaker C: dare you talk about Kevin Bacon that way?
[00:36:10] Speaker B: But I think Scream in terms of quality. I think if you were like, to average them out, which you shouldn't do with art, but whatever. But
[00:36:18] Speaker C: we all do.
[00:36:18] Speaker B: But we all do.
I think you have a couple duds, but some people think Scream 3 is. I've kind of become a Scream 3 truther.
[00:36:29] Speaker C: I think that there are people who love that one the best. I think it is polarizing.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: I mean, I think just Parker Posey. Just put Parker Posey in a movie and you sign
[00:36:39] Speaker C: up. I love that woman.
[00:36:40] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, you need to watch Scream 3. It's on Canopy. Tracy.
[00:36:44] Speaker C: Okay, I know, I know.
She plays the Courteney Cox character in Stab. Stab is
[00:36:49] Speaker B: the name, which
[00:36:50] Speaker C: is also so funny.
[00:36:53] Speaker B: Yes, yes.
And even, like, so 4, I think they probably should have stopped at 3, but 4 is, I think, pretty solid. 5 and 6, I think, are good. I'm, like, less inclined to them.
I won't talk about seven anyway.
[00:37:07] Speaker C: Nobody wants to talk about seven. No
[00:37:08] Speaker B: one wants to talk about seven.
[00:37:09] Speaker C: No one wants to talk about seven. I mean, this ended up making the careers of a ton of these people in this. Like, this was a huge turnaround. Courtney Cox was already in Friends, and this totally was able to get her out of that career trajectory. This totally boosted Matthew Lillard into a new career. Neve Campbell had really only ever been on party of five, and then she ends up being in this.
Rose McGowan ends up doing Charmed after this. Skeet Ulrich does a ton of teen films. Like, it launches the careers of a ton of people in these films.
Kevin
[00:37:41] Speaker B: Williamson, right. Like, this was his first. This
[00:37:44] Speaker C: was his first. Yeah. Like, purchase screenplay. And then he ends up going on to, like, direct and write even more things and, like, these huge popular things that all came out of Scream, which is basically him playing on this fear that he has of horror films. And then here we are, you know, so, you know.
[00:38:04] Speaker B: Yeah,
[00:38:04] Speaker C: Sometimes it's good to make funny art.
[00:38:06] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, it's. Yeah, yeah. It's good to be funny.
[00:38:10] Speaker C: It's good to be funny.
[00:38:11] Speaker B: Yeah, Yeah.
[00:38:12] Speaker C: I wouldn't know anything about that.
[00:38:15] Speaker B: Yeah, sure, sure, Tracy.
[00:38:18] Speaker C: I'm very meek. We talked about it.
[00:38:20] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Meek and Miles. Tracy here doling out wisdom.
[00:38:31] Speaker C: Any other high points you think we missed?
[00:38:33] Speaker B: No, I really. I really just wanted. I just wanted to subject a bunch of people to talk to me, talking about Scream, because I love. I love this movie. And it's the 30th anniversary. It's
[00:38:42] Speaker C: the 30th anniversary,
[00:38:44] Speaker B: and I wanted to encourage people to watch the series because I think, again, it's. It's pretty quality. So.
[00:38:49] Speaker C: And those first three are right there on Canopy. So you get started for free from your home. If you don't want to do a 30th anniversary screening at the movie theater, you can do it at your house. Yeah.
[00:38:58] Speaker B: Your
[00:38:58] Speaker C: cash.
[00:38:58] Speaker B: Yeah. You don't have to pay any, which
[00:39:00] Speaker C: is what I did.
[00:39:00] Speaker B: Yeah. And it's. I think it's two tickets right now in Canopy.
[00:39:03] Speaker C: Oh. So, like, not even a huge
[00:39:05] Speaker B: 2 and 3 are going to knock you for 4. But. But, you know,
[00:39:08] Speaker C: so it goes.
[00:39:09] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:09] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:39:10] Speaker B: Awesome. Well, thanks, Tracy. This was a lot of fun. Always
[00:39:13] Speaker C: a pleasure.
[00:39:13] Speaker B: Yeah. Delightful.
Weird to say about Scream, but delightful.
[00:39:18] Speaker C: Delightful.
[00:39:19] Speaker B: Well, thanks everyone for joining us and we will see you next time. Have a happy Halloween.
[00:39:26] Speaker A: Five Minute Film Finder is a digital program brought to you by Pioneer Library System in Oklahoma. All opinions expressed in this episode are those of the host and not those of the organization.
Five Minute Film Finder is produced, recorded and mixed by Ben Simmons C Theme music by Ben C.
If you have any questions, concerns or comments, please email
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Thanks for listening.
