Scream: Parody(?) of a Genre
Hey! This contains spoilers for the movie Scream. Duh! It’s probably older than most of the people reading this article. It’s awesome, go watch it if you haven’t. Don’t let me spoil it ;)
There are countless iconic items associated with horror movies: Ouija boards, chainsaws, balloons, and so on and so forth. But the most iconic of all the iconic items are undoubtedly masks. Whether it be Michael Meyers’ pale face, Jason Voorhees’ goalie mask, or Hannibal Lecter’s jaw restraint, there are masks that everyone associates with the horror genre, and who they belong to. There is one mask, however, that seems to have gone past the one(s) who originally put it on. The “ghostface” mask, “Scream mask,” or just simply “that horror movie mask” exists beyond its movie of origin. While Jason’s mask belongs to Jason, the Scream mask belongs to horror itself. How did a symbol from one movie become so iconic that it has encapsulated a whole genre?
Well, Scream itself is a bit of an oddity in terms of genre itself. Whether you’ve seen it or not (go watch it right now) no one is going to argue that Scream isn’t a horror movie. It’s filed with tense moments, jump scares, slasher-esque blood and gore, and a lot of teenagers being scared. That’s certainly a horror movie to me. And Wes Craven and the Scream team (lol) knew that. In fact, they knew a lot about horror/slasher movies, as the genre was becoming incredibly saturated. Halloween? Awesome! Friday the 13th? Incredible! The billion sequels and cheesy knockoffs those movies spawned? Uhhhh. The point being, everyone and their mother knew of the slasher movie tropes: exactly what the movies would do, who would die, and when the scares were coming. What’s the fun in that? I’m not anxiously awaiting going to the theater to see the 9th installment in the Halloween franchise, “Halloween 9, Michael goes to outer space and fights Jesus with a lightsaber.” Well, ok, that would actually be fucking hilarious, and I would totally pay to see that, but you get my point. Truly scary slasher movies seemed to be a thing of the past. What’s a director to do if they want to make one?
Wes Craven didn’t try to make us shit our pants seeing a new horror boogeyman. He knew that wouldn’t work, and honestly wasn't what the genre needed. He knew what the genre had become, and wanted to do something fresh. Not ghosts or aliens or monsters or found footage fresh, but something that understood itself. Something to play with those overused tropes the genre had become so fond of. You can’t make a slasher movie in this day and age and pretend that the characters don’t know what’s up. Don’t pretend like Michael Meyers doesn’t occupy at least a little space in a teenager’s mind. You can’t make them dumb, so make them smart, play into it: that’s what Scream does. Everyone has seen a slasher movie, and they know they’re just movies, so it will never happen to them.
“Movies don’t create psychos. Movies make psychos more creative.” They also make directors more creative. And directors like Wes Craven want to do something creative in a genre that needs it. Scream acknowledges the genre: the main characters are all horror movie fans who know the tropes. It parodies the genre, with a silly masked killer making house calls and terrorizing a town while the high schoolers make fun of it. And yet it is the genre: it has a twist villain(s) who are for real psychos who are capable of killing. Its not a full-blown parody—it still is a slasher horror movie, and it knows that! Billy and Stu don’t have Michael Meyers or Jason Vorhees superpowers where they survive anything thrown at them, they’re smart and have a plan that subverts expectations. Yes, Randy survives, and he’s a virgin, and they acknowledge that! They make a joke that has merit because of the cliché, oversaturated genre, but they continue to build a movie around that genre, because they know what not to do.
You can’t fully make a movie in a genre without having an understanding of said genre and of what you want to do within it. Scream is a wonderful example of that understanding. The Scream Team™ was faithful with their idea to buck the trends of Hollywood slashers, yet to use them in a way that’s creative. I love Scream, I love genre parodies that actually make wonderful additions to a genre, and I love horror movies that can make me laugh and audibly scream (HAHA).
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