Scary Movie
review by Bobby Blakey
I love spoof comedies, but sadly we don’t get many of them these days especially good ones. In 2000 Keenen, Marlon and Shawn Wayans took on the horror genre for the hilarious Scary Movie. After its success they dropped another outrageous funny entry with Scary Movie 2 in 2001. After some behind the scenes drama the Wayans were no longer attached to the franchise, but it kept going with three more sequels in 2003, 2006, and 2013. It seemed the series was finally done, but now the Wayans are back in the driving seat with A Haunted House 1 & 2 and Fifty Shades of Black director Michael Tiddes at the helm. Could this inject the franchise and the genre with the laugh’s fans want, or will it fail to scare any up?
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Scary Movie (6) follows twenty-six years after outrunning a suspiciously familiar masked killer, the Core Four are back in the killer’s crosshairs and no horror movie IP is safe. Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, Anna Faris, and Regina Hall reunite in Scary Movie alongside returning favorites and fresh faces to slash through reboots, remakes, requels, prequels, sequels, spin-offs, elevated horror, origin stories, anything with the word legacy in it, and every “final chapter” that absolutely isn’t final. Nothing is sacred. No trope survives. Every line gets crossed. The Wayans are back to cancel the Cancel Culture.
I was so excited to return to this franchise and enjoyed revisiting all five of the previous films. I know they don’t all work, but they still entertain me and make me laugh so had high hopes for this latest chapter as well. I had heard some saying there were no laughs to be had this time around so got concerned, but not sure what film they saw. I laughed plenty of times throughout this latest entry and had a fun time. Not all of it works and there are plenty of jokes that feel forced, but there are also plenty that had me laughing out loud.
The story is minimal with them heading back to the original formula this time following Scream 5 and 6 stories closely with the expected infusion of other properties including Halloween, The Substance, Terrifier, Weapons, Get out
and so many more. It weaves in and out of the main story to mixed results to try to get all these parody moments in making it feel like an episode of Family Guy in story telling format. This works well enough but there are a few moments that aren’t near as funny if you aren’t in the know about the film or genre, they are poking fun at.
It was great fun to see all the returning cast, and the new additions were fine, but a lot of the cameos are shoehorned in for nostalgia and nothing more. I loved them despite them not always making sense, but again it’s pure nostalgia for fans of the franchise and not much else. There are some strange edits and cuts that mess with the flow of the film here and there, but in the end I got what I expected out of it and that was a good laugh.
These kinds of films don’t work for everyone and for sure isn’t anywhere near as good as the original, but I still had some fun. It’s not breaking down any walls in the genre, but I hope it does well enough to at least get the spoof genre back into the forefront of entertainment and cuts loose the ridiculous fun once again.
Decide for yourself and check out Scary Movie (6) in theaters now from Paramount.
