Scary Movie
2000 · Directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans
Original language: English
- comedy
The story
A familiar-looking group of teenagers find themselves being stalked by a more-than-vaguely recognizable masked killer! As the victims begin to pile up and the laughs pile on, none of your favorite scary movies escape the razor-sharp satire of this outrageously funny parody!
What it’s like
Bright, flat suburban daylight and fluorescent-lit school hallways give way to the murky, over-lit gloom of a parody of slasher cinema, with the camera mimicking the stock framing of late-90s horror: tight close-ups on screaming faces, dolly-ins on doorways, and wide shots of dark country roads and sleepy houses that are played straight and then undercut. The palette is saturated and bright, with teal-tinged night scenes and glossy, unmoody digital sheen, and the score leans on familiar genre stings and thumping synth cues that are constantly broken by a punchline. The vibe is loud, sophomoric and gleefully irreverent, the kind of thing you put on with friends on a Friday night or as a crude, forgettable pick for a group watch. Pacing is quick and relentless, with gags stacked on gags so that a joke often lands on the next one before the last has finished. The emotional register is brash and cheerful; its teenagers are archetypes (the ditz, the sweet nerd, the wannabe tough guy) who fumble toward self-awareness without any real arc. Intensity is high on crude sexual humor, drug jokes, profanity and bloody slasher kills played for laughs, with some genuine gore and a few jump-scare moments, but no sustained dread. It suits viewers who want raunchy, unpretentious genre satire and enjoy gross-out comedy more than suspense.
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