Posts Tagged ‘Kevin Williamson’
Monday, July 3rd, 2023
I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER is a major pillar in the late ‘90s streak of newfangled glossy studio teen slasher movies. It was released less than a year after SCREAM, two months before SCREAM 2, and three months before Dawson’s Creek started airing, so it was the first real test of whether or not SCREAM was a fluke for screenwriter Kevin Williamson. He’d already been hired and written this loose adaptation of the 1973 young adult suspense novel by Lois Duncan before SCREAM, but when that was a hit all the sudden it became a priority. Williamson was still involved, seeming to have a hand in choosing the director and cast, according to interviews.
Set on two consecutive 4th of July holidays in the small fishing town of Southport, North Carolina, it’s the story of fresh high school graduates Julie James (Jennifer Love Hewitt, CAN’T HARDLY WAIT), Ray Bronson (Freddie Prinze Jr., DELGO), Barry Cox (Ryan Phillippe, 54) and Helen Shivers (Sarah Michelle Gellar, SOUTHLAND TALES) accidentally running over someone late at night while driving home from drinking on the beach. Worried about their lives being ruined by manslaughter charges, they decide that rather than report it they should dump the body in the water and swear to never speak of it again. As kids do. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: 4th of July, Anne Heche, Bridgette Wilson, Freddie Prinze Jr., J. Don Ferguson, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jim Gillespie, John Debney, Johnny Galecki, Jonathan Quint, Kevin Williamson, Lois Duncan, Muse Watson, Ryan Phillippe, Sarah Michelle Gellar, slashers
Posted in Reviews, Horror | 24 Comments »
Friday, March 17th, 2023
As I mentioned in my SCREAM VI review and elsewhere, I consider Wes Craven’s SCREAM (1996) to be one of the great horror films of the ‘90s, and since then I have dutifully watched each of the sequels as they were released and enjoyed at least parts of them. SCREAM 2 seemed quite good in 1997, but my attachment to it has faded over the years. SCREAM 3 was disappointing in 2000, and hasn’t much grown on me. That seemed to be the end of it, and it seemed questionable when a SCREAM 4 came along 11 years later.
I remember I saw it at a preview screening. After the debacle of CURSED and the (enjoyable) mess of MY SOUL TO TAKE, I didn’t necessarily believe that Craven would be able to pull off the difficult task of a decade-plus-later part 4 that few had asked for. I also remember there was a guy sitting near the front talking to himself and the screen throughout the movie, being pretty annoying, but when it was over and he was leaving he made direct eye contact with me and said, “That was great!” with so much more enthusiasm than I had for the movie that I forgave him. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Adam Brody, Aimee Teegarden, Alison Brie, Anna Paquin, Anthony Anderson, Britt Robertson, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Ehren Krueger, Emma Roberts, Erik Knudsen, Hayden Panettiere, Kevin Williamson, Kristen Bell, Marielle Jaffe, Mary McDonnell, meta-slashers, Neve Campbell, Paul Harris Boardman, Roger L. Jackson, Rory Culkin, slashers, Wes Craven
Posted in Reviews, Horror | 4 Comments »
Monday, January 16th, 2023
SICK is a new independently produced slasher picked up by Blumhouse and Miramax (?) but sent straight to the Peacock streaming service. For me it was a must-watch-immediately because it’s the latest from John Hyams, who has been a top director in my mind since UNIVERSAL SOLDIER: REGENERATION back in 2009. (See also: THE SMASHING MACHINE, RANK, DRAGON EYES, UNIVERSAL SOLDIER: DAY OF RECKONING, ALONE). But outside these parts he’s not that well known, so the marketing is all about it being the latest from Kevin Williamson (SCREAM, THE FACULTY). He co-wrote it with Katelyn Crabb (whose only previous credit is as his assistant on SCREAM ’22).
I believe it’s a script they came up with and/or wrote during lockdown, so the gimmick is that it’s set during that surreal time of toilet paper scarceness and droplet paranoia, specifically April 3, 2020. A young man named Tyler (Joel Courtney, SUPER 8, THE EMPTY MAN) gets to be the Drew Barrymore of the cold open, getting creepy texts from an unknown number while he’s trying to buy groceries. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Beth Million, COVID-19, Dylan Sprayberry, Jane Adams, Joel Courtney, John Hyams, Katelyn Crabb, Kevin Williamson, Marc Menchaca
Posted in Reviews | 9 Comments »
Tuesday, October 25th, 2022
During this year’s October viewing I wanted to revisit a few things that I consider lesser movies from directors I like, that I haven’t seen since they came out decades ago. You know – just to be sure.
I started with a forgotten later one from George A. Romero – his last non-living-dead-related movie, BRUISER. I was disappointed in it at the time, but that was 22 years ago, and I’d had high expectations for it since he hadn’t had a movie in 7 years. There was that gap between his Hollywood stint in the early ‘90s and his return in the new millennium, and it was in the middle of that period that I became obsessed with DAWN OF THE DEAD and KNIGHTRIDERS and everything. So it was a big event when he finally came back with this odd French-American co-production starring a dude from LOCK, STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Andrew Tarbet, Beatriz Pizano, Bebe Neuwirth, Bernie Wrightson, Bruce Kimmel, Clea DuVall, David Wechter, Elijah Wood, Famke Janssen, George Romero, Jason Flemyng, Jon Stewart, Jordana Brewster, Josh Hartnett, Kevin Williamson, Laura Harris, Leslie Hope, Nina Garbiras, Peter Stormare, Robert Patrick, Robert Rodriguez, Salma Hayek, Shawn Hatosy, The Misfits, Tom Atkins
Posted in Horror, Reviews, Science Fiction and Space Shit | 39 Comments »
Monday, January 17th, 2022
We interrupt this Sam Raimi series so I can have a semi-timely review of the new SCREAM movie.
I have some bad news. SCREAM – a teen horror movie that came out when I was older than a teen but I enjoyed it along with the younger people anyway – is 25 fucking years old! And you remember how it was a trilogy and we assumed that was it, but a little while back kind of out of the blue they made a way late part 4? Well, I’m sorry to say that even that happened eleven god damn years ago. How is that possible? It’s not. But it happened. We are old, my friends. Very, very old.
But some of us still like SCREAM and the i.p. gods or whoever decided that the time has come for another one in another era. Many things have changed since the last one. Obviously horror has changed, as it always does. But more importantly the director of the original four, Wes Craven, has passed away, and (in better news) the Weinstein Company has died and gone to Hell, so this is the first time the series has been continued by a new set of people. The rights were picked up by Spyglass Media Group, James Vanderbilt (THE RUNDOWN, ZODIAC) & Guy Busick (READY OR NOT, Castle Rock) wrote the script, and Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett (the team behind READY OR NOT) directed it, in the Craven spirit but not trying to be a throwback or anything. (There’s even a joke about overlit ‘90s movies.) Original writer Kevin Williamson did give his blessing and sign on as executive producer, and has given many interviews (such as on Mick Garris’ podcast Post-Mortem) verifying that he really was involved and is excited about the movie. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Dylan Minnette, Guy Busick, Jack Quaid, James Vanderbilt, Jasmin Savoy Brown, Jenna Ortega, Kevin Williamson, Marley Shelton, Mason Gooding, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Melissa Barrera, meta-slashers, Mikey Madison, Neve Campbell, Roger L. Jackson, slashers, Sonia Ben Ammar, Tyler Gillett
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 32 Comments »
Friday, October 30th, 2015
Earlier this month when I reviewed HALLOWEEN II I wrote that it was “easily one of the best or the best HALLOWEEN sequel they made.” I was being a little cagey, saving it for today to reveal my opinion that the actual best sequel is 1998’s HALLOWEEN H20: TWENTY YEARS LATER. First I watched it again and verified that the verdict still stands now that we’re only a couple years away from being able to make HALLOWEEN H20-20: HALLOWEEN H20 TWENTY YEARS LATER. Also this time I learned that it plays even better when watched immediately after II.
It seems designed for that, because it begins with “Mr. Sandman” by the Chordettes, the same thing that played as Laurie rode off in the ambulance at the end of II. Unlike the other sequels it leaves Loomis dead after blowing himself up with Michael (Donald Pleasance had passed away by this point anyway). But Laurie isn’t the only major character to survive II: there was also Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens), Loomis’s nurse colleague. That’s who Michael comes after first.
Marion’s still working as a nurse, and still chain smoking. She comes home to her house in a different Illinois suburb besides Haddonfield and finds it broken into. The police take their sweet time coming, but two neighbor boys (one played by Joseph Gordon Levitt, SHADOWBOXER, KILLSHOT, LINCOLN) keep her company while she waits. I like that because in HALLOWEEN Laurie tried to run to a neighbor’s house for help and they turned off the lights and wouldn’t answer the door. Marion does have helpful neighbors, but things don’t turn out any better.
Of course this is the opening kill scene, but it’s also a strategic move by Michael, who ransacks Marion’s office, searches her files and leaves an empty one labeled “Laurie Strode,” signaling that he’s figured out the whereabouts of his sister (a triumphantly returning Jamie Lee Curtis), last survivor of the Halloween Murders. She’s in California, working as headmistress at a boarding school attended by her 17 year old son John (introducing Josh Hartnett) under the assumed name Kari Tate. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Adam Hann-Byrd, Alan Arkin, Jamie Lee Curtis, Jodi Lyn O'Keefe, John Ottman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Josh Hartnett, Kevin Williamson, LL Cool J, Matt Greenberg, Michelle Williams, Nancy Stephens, part 7s, Robert Zappia, slashers, Steve Miner
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 88 Comments »
Monday, October 5th, 2015
SCREAM 2 is a slasher sequel that had a rare level of difficulty. The fringe nature of the subgenre normally allows part 2s some leeway as exploitational cash grabs, making room for everything from an okay continuation (HALLOWEEN II) to an experimental misstep (A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET PART 2: FREDDY’S REVENGE) to a perfection of the formula (FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 2) to a re-inventing masterpiece-in-its-own-right (TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2). But SCREAM was such a mainstream smash hit, and it created such a new interest in horror among non-horror people, that it had different expectations to live up to.
Also, its horror-movie-where-the-characters-know-about-horror-movies gimmick positioned it as sort of above horror movies, so they couldn’t get away with a normal sequel, they had to also say something about sequels. At the same time, it couldn’t really follow the template of the sequels it was supposed to be commenting on because it’s a series where the bad guys die and the good guys come back in sequels, so it’s a totally different type of story from most popular slashers.
As if all that wasn’t a tall enough hurdle to jump over, this was maybe the first movie production to get screwed by internet spoilers. A first draft of the script got leaked online, so they changed the twist ending during filming. (I bet Elise Neal was bummed she didn’t get to do her killer reveal speech.) (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Elise Neal, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jamie Kennedy, Jerry O'Connell, Kevin Williamson, Laurie Metcalf, Liev Schrieber, meta-slashers, Neve Campbell, Omar Epps, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Timothy Olyphant, Wes Craven
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 64 Comments »
Sunday, April 17th, 2011
The SCREAM movies had their day in the sun. They arrived at the end of 1996, during what seemed like a horror drought. “Horror” was so out of sorts that the characters just call it “scary movies.” The actors, while promoting it on talk shows, called it a “thriller.”
We all remember that, but I thought it would be interesting to look up the specifics. According to my research there were only six other scary movie thrillers released theatrically that year: CANDYMAN: FAREWELL TO THE FLESH, THE DENTIST, THE FRIGHTENERS, FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, HELLRAISER: BLOODLINE* and THINNER. DTV releases included TREMORS 2: AFTERSHOCKS, CARNOSAUR 3: PRIMAL SPECIES and CHILDREN OF THE CORN IV: THE GATHERING.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Anthony Anderson, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Kevin Williamson, meta-slashers, Neve Campbell, slashers, Wes Craven
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 187 Comments »
Tuesday, October 28th, 2008
Producers of violent horror movies like to claim their movies are “controversial.” Here’s a more mainstream-acceptable horror movie that actually is controversial among movie fans. It was hugely popular at the time, but it seems to me like most horror fans today look down on it or sent it. Like it or not, SCREAM was an important landmark in the ongoing history of the horror. It singlehandedly resuscitated the rotting corpse of the slasher movie (at least in its whodunit form inspired by FRIDAY THE 13TH, SLEEPAWAY CAMP, PROM NIGHT, TERROR TRAIN, etc.) It made horror big business again, paving the way for an onslaught of low (and medium) budget horror that otherwise wouldn’t have happened. But alot of horror fans see themselves as outsiders, so it bugs them when a horror movie is popular with people who aren’t as into stabbing and monsters as they are. And in my opinion there is a certain amount of sexism there, because they get mad about teenage girls liking the same movies as them. (Don’t tell them that HALLOWEEN is about teenage girls, they might cry.) (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Kevin Williamson, Neve Campbell, slashers, Wes Craven
Posted in Horror, Reviews | 13 Comments »
Friday, February 25th, 2005
SPOILER ALERT !!
Hey folks, Harry here to bestow upon you the glory and the greatness that is the mighty Vern. He wades through films and text like the Grim Reaper in a Corn Field…. shitting out the husks of material that dreams of better days. Now he turns his excellence at Wes Craven’s troubled latest. A film left hemorraging from the Dimension process, but with a pedigree of cool otherwise. Let’s see what Vern says…
Harry –
Don’t know if you’re sick of me yet this week but I just saw CURSED one day early, so what the fuck man you know what happens next. A review, some belligerent talkbacks, etc.
This is the new one from Wes Craven, who in my eyes at least still has some small amount of credibility. I know he tries his damndest to piss it away on executive produced projects like DRACULA 2000, WISHMASTER, WES CRAVEN’S SO-CALLED CARNIVAL OF SOULS, etc. And he’s done some bad ones all throughout his career. Like DEADLY FRIEND and DEADLY BLESSING. I forget which one is which. One of them involves a robot. And VAMPIRE IN BROOKLYN. And THE HILLS HAVE EYES 2. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Christina Ricci, Jesse Eisenberg, Joshua Jackson, Kevin Williamson, werewolves, Wes Craven
Posted in AICN, Comedy/Laffs, Horror, Reviews, Thriller | 11 Comments »
