Scream to Scream, Scene by Scene: SCENE 20 of Scream (0:53:01-0:55:47)

In this project I attempt to review the entire Scream trilogy scene by scene in chronological order. Heavy spoilers and gore throughout!

SCENE 20
Length: 2mins 45secs
Primary Characters: Randy Meeks, Stu Macher and Billy Loomis
Pop Culture References:

• Frankenstein (movie plays in video store)
• Mother's Boys, Smoke, Clerks and Just Another Girl on the I.R.T. (film posters hang in the store)
  
• Prom Night (Randy mentions this as the key to the crimes)
• The Howling and E.T. (a customer inquires about both)
  

I think this scene acts much like the Principal Himbry murder scene in that it merely gives us more time with certain characters (specifically Randy) and gives just a little bit more to mull over for the home stretch. The way it makes it so obvious that they're trying to make viewers think Billy is the killer (I remember it being a big surprise that there were two so at this stage first time viewers wouldn't be thinking of a duo), so much so that I'm sure many thought "nah, that'd be too obvious."


Whatta klutz!


"We've had a run in the mass-murder section!"
This here, ladies and gentlemen, is the very middle of Scream. I think that line of dialogue is quite an apt one considering the success of Scream less to a rush of horror titles. This shot is the 196th screencap that I have taken so far for this series, which sounds like a lot... because it is. Yikes. I was kinda hoping it would be the 200th, but unfortunately that didn't pan out.


"What's that werewolf movie with ET's mom in it?"
Before I discovered IMDb and before I knew who Dee Wallace was (oh, the humanity) I used to think this line was a joke about someone incredibly ugly ("ET's mom" as in his alien mother) and not just an actual bit of movie trivia. The answer? The Howling. I like that Wes Craven's The Hills Have Eyes had a reference to Steven Spielberg's Jaws and then all these years later he's doing it again!

Just look at this shot for a second though and consider the last time you ever saw a movie rental place that big. In light of Blockbuster going bankrupt I'm sure there will be a few obituaries such as this one, recalling the good ol' days. I even have a blogger tag labelled "VHS Memories" about anytime that I discuss my fondness of visiting the local video store as a child/teenager (first family owned business and then eventually Network Video, Civic Video and Blockbuster) and perusing the isles, looking at all the amazing video sleeve artwork and wanting to watch them all. Sigh. Good times.


Jamie Kennedy looks like such a baby in this movie. I mean, he actually got kinda hot in Scream 2 and these days he's fugly and gross, but he was definitely hot in Scream 2. Just wait and there's be plenty of screencapping for that!


If you squint it almost looks like Randy and Stu are about to kiss. Considering how homo-erotic this movie is I wouldn't put it past 'em.


That is the 200th screencap. Amazing. And to think, we've still got half the movie to go!! I like that Randy pieced (almost) everything together before everyone else though. It's fitting. He correctly guessed Billy as the killer and Stu as his "lapdog" and he was right about Sidney's father being a part of the killer's plot ("his body will come popping up in the last reel somewhere!"), he just didn't predict there'd be two killers. That's where Randy's movie knowledge slipped him up, always expecting a lone murderer when he should've known whoever it was was going to do something different.

I want to bring to light my favourite extra. She clearly didn't listen when told "don't look at the camera!"






Then she just shakes her head and walks away. I love it! Who she is, I'll never know.


That really was in poor taste, Billy.


The best bit about Stu's weird hyper moments is when he comes back down and says stuff with such deadpan sincerity like this moment. "No I don't. At all. No."

"This is standard horror movie stuff. Prom Night revisited, man. ... if they'd watch Prom Night they'd save time. There's a formula to it, a very simple formula. EVERYBODY'S A SUSPECT!"

Oh, Randy!

I'm trying to remember Prom Night and I don't recall how any of that movie relates to the goings on in Woodsboro. I only saw that Canadian horror movie for the first time earlier this year and wasn't the killer in Prom Night Jamie Lee Curtis' BROTHER? In fact, that movie did try to position the final girl's father (played by Leslie Neilson of all people) as the prime suspect, but her boyfriend it was not. Of course, maybe Randy was just getting confused with the amazingness of Prom Night II: Hello Mary Lou?


It's no wonder the video store "fired his ass" ("twice!") if he does stuff like this on a regular basis.



It really is amazing how much Billy appears to be trying to come off looking like the killer. Threatening people in broad daylight and all.


Was there a lot of gay slash fiction written after Scream? I can't imagine a world in which there wouldn't be? Was it so completely obvious to everyone in 1996 how gay this movie was? Like, actually very homoerotic (we've always discussed this, but it bears repeating.)


"What would be your motive?"
"It's the millennium; motives are incidental."
"Millennium. Millennium, I like that. That's good, millennium. Good kid."
Nothing dates a movie quite like millennium references. Why not throw in a "Y2K bug" joke just for fun?


Love that evil look that Billy gives to Stu as if to say "we're total badasses." Also, Probably the only time in the entire movie that Skeet Ulrich is attractive.


My "Movies in Movies" series used the Mother's Boys poster shot up there for this movie, but this scene also features clearly visible posters for other Miramax titles such as Smoke and Clerks. One poster I did not expect to see, and I only just picked it up now as I screencapped the movie, was a poster for Just Another Girl on the I.R.T. Now, I know Weinsteins obviously just filled this video store with posters for their own movies on the off chance that some obsessive weirdo such as myself was paying attention (there are more posters in the background but I cannot make them out), but Just Another Girl wasn't a particularly popular movie in 1992 when it came out, so I'm not sure why this video store in northern California would have a poster for it up in 1996.

Nevertheless, I really like Just Another Girl on the I.R.T.. It's flaws are obvious, but they're forgivable when the lead performance by Ariyan A. Johnson is so strong and the sense of place that director Leslie Harris creates in these districts of New York City is so evocative. I wish they'd release it on DVD.

Okay, that little detour was brought to you by my bizarre ability to recognise a blurry movie poster for a movie almost nobody knows. Next extry will be back to Scream.

Intro, Scene 1 Scene 2, Scene 3, Scene 4, Scene 5, Scene 6, Scene 7, Scene 8, Scene 9, Scene 10, Scene 11, Scene 12, Scene 13, Scene 14, Scene 15, Scene 16, Scene 17, Scene 18, Scene 19