Scream to Scream, Scene by Scene: SCENE 5 of Scream 3 (0:12:28-0:19:24)

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



SCENE 5 of Scream 3
Length: 6mins 54secs
Primary Characters: Roman Bridger (Scott Foley), John Milton (Lance Henrikson), "Studio Executive" (Roger Corman), (Detective?) Wallace (Josh Pais), Tyson Fox (Deon Richmond), Tom Prinze (Matt Keeslar), Sarah Darling (Jenny McCarthy), Angelina Tyler (Emily Mortimer), Gale Weathers, Jennifer Jolie (Parker Posey), Dewey Riley (David Arquette),
Pop Culture References:

• Tori Spelling and David Schwimmer (Named as former Stab cast-members)
• LL Cool J/William Shakespeare and Usher/Pinter (Weird combo's for black actors mentioned by Tyson)
• Freddy Prinze Jr, Angelina Jolie, Jennifer Aniston, Sarah Michelle Gellar, etc (All the Stab cast have names made up of other famous actors)
• 60 Minutes 2 (Gale was a reporter for this show)
• Brad Pitt (Jennifer Jolie used to date him)
• Roger Corman (Cameo)
• Jay & Silent Bob (Cameo)
• Connie Chung (Jay and Silent Bob mention her)

There was a brief rumour during the production of Scream 4 that it was going to have the subtitle of "Return to Woodsboro", but I never believed that because Stab 3 had that name and that'd just be silly.

Why hello there big burly security man on the left. Clearly this extra should've been cast in Patrick Warburton's role as Jennifer Jolie's security guard.

"Violence in cinema's a big deal right now, Roman. This is not the kind of news this studio is after."
"So if we stop making scary movies all the psychos in the world will retire? Come on."
I love that they got Roger freakin' Corman for a cameo as a movie executive telling a director that he's worried about violent content. Oh the irony. Of course, Corman's line right there is an obvious reference to Scream 3's own behind the scenes dramas, which had the original idea of a "return to Woodsboro" being scrapped due to the media's recent fascination with violence in media after the Columbine school shootings. Roman's line, however, is almost a direct lift from Billy Loomis in the original Scream, which is just the first instance of Roman Bridger being lame. The second instance are his clothes. Gawd, he wears ugly clothes. But, then, this was 2000 and Scream 3's costume designer, Abigail Murray, was clearly on drugs so not entirely her fault I guess.

Lame.

"Detectives, there's no reason to presume Cotton's death had anything to do with this movie, is there?"
"He was making a movie called Stab; he was stabbed."
Oh Wallace!

From left to right we have Deon Richmond as Tyson Fox as Rick, the video store employee clearly a "Randy substitute/homage"; Jenny McCarthy as Sarah Darling as Candy, the hot chick who dies third who does indeed die third; Matt Keeslar as Tommy Prinze as Deputy Dewey, no longer played by David Schwimmer; Emily Mortimer as Angelina Tyler as Sidney Prescott, longer played by Tori Spelling. Phew, make sense?

"I'm starting to see why Tori Spelling and David Schwimmer didn't want to come back."
I guess you know your low-rent horror franchise is in bad shape when Tori Spelling and David Schwimmer think they have better stuff to do with their time! Oh hai there Emily Mortimer. I love that the Scream franchise really does have quite a few actors who went on to become quote unquote legitimate like here Emily Mortimer. Now's she's in films by Scorsese and Pixar. Of course, Mortimer as Angelina Tyler would have obviously been so much better if they'd gone through with the original plan of having her as the second killer Oh man, what a wasted opportunity! And it's quite obvious, too, that they were setting that storyline up to occur and then they just... ugh. Yet another misjudged aspect of Scream 3, unfortunately.

Review: Cars 2

Cars 2
Dir. John Lasseter & Brad Lewis
Year: 2011
Aus Rating: PG
Running Time: 113mins

That sound you hear is the screeching of breaks on the seemingly unstoppable Pixar express. After 15 years of peerless computer animation and cinematic magic, the Pixar juggernaut has come to a severe end with Cars 2. A follow-up to their 2006 charmer Cars, this year’s annual Pixar entry lacks everything that makes their movies so good. Missing the emotion, pathos and laughs (for anyone over the age of ten) Cars 2 places merchandising revenue over quality entertainment, with the film being excessive and overwrought in every department.

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine
It's not good. D+

Black & White Friday: Shutter Island

Perhaps an obvious choice, but even though I didn't like the movie I still thought there would be enough within it to sustain a Black & White Friday entry. I was surprised by how modern the film felt and, perhaps, I might have liked it more if it had surrendered to the classicism of it all (not that I would expect Martin Scorsese to go there, but this tale was begging for a big ol' noir-tinged camp telling, don't you think?) I just could not buy Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo as characters from the 1950s and with so many modern filmmaking flourished from Scorsese mixed with the obvious gothicism of it all and Shutter Island felt confused and really quite boring.


Interesting, I found the art direction of Shutter Island quite bothersome. The exterior scenes were great, but the interior ones were just too over the top in 1950s insane asylum decor. And yet when the colour is gone I feel that the interior scenes looked better. Strange, that. Whoever scouted this location, however, deserves a special cheque from Marty.


I quite liked Ben Kingsley here. Not in any particular "wow, his acting is superb" kind of way, but I thought he totally fit into the vibe of the movie. I can see him slotting right into the same role had this movie been made in 1954 (er, if he'd been alive and all that jazz of course) with his propensity to overact and be a bit larger than life. It's just a shame that Martin didn't really frame him in any particularly interesting ways.


The skies of this movie always looked so manufactured (and not in a matte kinda way like they would've been in the past), just so much CGI! gah! In black and white they look excellent, though.


See what I mean? Lovely shot by any means.


This is what I was talking about before. In the movie, this scene is just quite putrid and unappealing, but in black and white it feels so much more classical and less like I'm gonna get tetanus.





The women of Shutter Island. Scorsese can work miracles with actresses so it is always a shame when he doesn't just knuckle down and make a movie with a female lead role. He went there with The Age of Innocence and it's one of Marty's very best and just thinking of the performances from the likes of Sandra Bernhard, Lorraine Bracco, Cate Blanchett, Sharon Stone and the women of After Hours makes me shudder in delight. My favourite of the women in Shutter Island was Patricia Clarkson (and I love the shot I captured of her, actually looking quite old fashioned) because she was just so "on" and focused. Her role is thankless, really, but she does good stuff with it. Same goes for underrated actress Robin Bartlett (at the top). Emily Mortimer is good in her prison cell scene, too, although I admit I was very wrong about predicting her Oscar win.

And that leaves Michelle Williams, the weakest of the four. She doesn't really get much to do, does she? Despite having the most screen time of them all she basically just has to stand around and look a little bit sick, a little big ethereal and a little bit like there's not much going on upstairs. I chose this shot, however, because it reminded me of a similar moment in David Lynch's Mulholland Drive which, let's face it, Scorsese was clearly inspired by in some respects.


I really liked this scene. It had compelling actors actually doing good acting, advancing the story (and not just needless plodding like so much of the rest of the movie) and it was one of the very few moments that fully embraced the concept of this kinda noir, kinda camp, kinda artificial world (notice how it actually does look like an old kinda movie that it's halfheartedly trying to be).


This moment very much looks like a shot from an old movie, I reckon. Perhaps that's because we can't see the faces of any of the very modern actors? Perhaps.