THE F*CKING BLACK SHEEP: Scream 3 (2000)

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

THE BLACK SHEEP is an ongoing column featuring different takes on films that either the writer HATED, but that the majority of film fans LOVED, or that the writer LOVED, but that most others LOATH. We’re hoping this column will promote constructive and geek fueled discussion. Dig in!

Scream 3 (2000)
Directed by Wes Craven

“Scream 3 isn’t nearly as bad as remembered…and kept the franchise rolling like a well-oiled murder machine.”

If you think about it, horror has always been the most lucrative film genre out there. Oh sure, the Avatars of the world make enough money to fund the US government for a few months, but those are risky endeavors and don’t happen very often. Instead, cheap and quick is what Hollywood really likes, and moreover a franchise that can sustain itself for a decade or longer. No genre can do that like horror can. Do you think that when Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween or Friday the 13th came out that anyone predicted its longevity? That it would survive for nearly two decades and spit out sequel after sequel? Doubtful.

Anyway, point is no one should’ve been surprised when Scream 4 was announced a while back. For the younger crowd out there, it’s hard to fathom in the impact the first Scream had if you weren’t there. It came at a time when the genre was hanging by a blood vessel, waiting for a transfusion of originality to prevent it from disappearing into complete obscurity. When it arrived in 1996, it was a needed and desired breath of fresh air. It tore the genre a new asshole, and for good reason.

But while it parodied horror and called it out for the soulless money generating machine it is, Scream sold its own soul and starting making sequels. Of those sequels, Scream 3 is by far the most dismissed, the forgotten one. Should it be? Should it be relegated as a Return of the Jedi, a Godfather 3, a Halloween Part III, or a Problem Child 2? No. It shouldn’t. Scream 3 isn’t nearly as bad as remembered. In fact, it was pretty damn entertaining and kept the franchise rolling like a well-oiled murder machine. While Scream 3 might not pack the sucker punch of the original, no one can fault it for that. It’s part three after all, and it does a hellva job satirizing Hollywood itself, bringing Sidney and company to the very place that sucked the tit of the genre dry.

With any part three, some elements end up a bit watered down and suffer repetitive movie disorder, the same disease that killed off the Austin Powers franchise. Regardless, Scream 3 isn’t completely recycled. Craven and new writer Ehren Kruger (who replaced series creator Kevin Williamson) attempted to keep the characters rounded, allowing them to grow outside what we witnessed in the theaters. Everyone in the film looks game to be there. Jenny McCarthy looks great. Liev Schreiber makes the notable celebrity intro death. Patrick Dempsey seems happy to be employed. And the recently separated David Arquette/Courtney Cox appear to love their roles, and I dug seeing them again. They’re like lovable long distance cousins who only come to visit every few years. However, the one who appeared bored the whole thing was Neve Campbell. And I don’t blame her. Her character arch seemed completed in the last movie (maybe in the first), but then again with Scream it doesn’t matter. There’s always a fresh crop of corpses to litter the set with. Arquette and Cox more than make up for Neve’s curbed enthusiasm as their characters need no arch. They’re a pair of idiots who bumble through each outing, somehow surviving in spite of themselves.

When it comes to Ghostface, well, I’m not sure how he really stacks up as a killer. Since he changes every time to a new person, it doesn’t have the same carryover effect. Yes, it adds mystery, but it lacks suspense because I know it’ll be someone in the end. Regradless, at this stage it’s a mute point. No one watches it for the mystery. They watch it for the characters and for the killings, which is my one major complaint. It seems Craven seemed content with some stabbings and an explosion. Nothing too elaborate or creative in the death category, which is a shame considering it is Craven. But beyond all that, I love a movie within a movie, a pseudo form of metafiction in its attempt at killing Hollywood. I dig the sets of the “real” places we’ve seen before. I dig the hollowness that the Stab franchise has created in everyone.

Scream 3 manages to maintain the entertainment value and suspense of the original even if it lacks the initial freshness. Sure, the humor isn’t quite at the same level, but that doesn’t take away from it. The movie stands on it on. Let’s just see if Craven and company can do it once again a full decade after the fact. Maybe it’s the Problem Child sequel that no one wanted, or it’s the one that everyone has been waiting for.

Disagree? Get the DVD and discover for yourself.

GET SCREAM 3 DVD HERE

GET SCREAM 3 BLU RAY HERE