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Scream 3

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Scream 3
File:Scream3poster.jpg
Scream 3 film poster
Directed byWes Craven
Written byEhren Kruger
Produced byCathy Konrad,
Wes Craven,
Marianne Maddalena
StarringNeve Campbell
Courteney Cox Arquette
David Arquette
Jamie Kennedy
Patrick Dempsey
Jenny McCarthy
Liev Schreiber
Parker Posey
Matt Keeslar
Deon Richmond
Kelly Rutherford
Distributed byWarner Bros. Pictures
Release dates
February 4th, 2000
Running time
117 min.
LanguageEnglish
Budget$40,000,000 (est.)
Box office$161,834,276

Template:Infobox movie certificates Scream 3 (2000) (theatrical name "Scr3am") is the third installment in the successful Scream trilogy of satirical horror films.

The film stars Neve Campbell, David Arquette and Courteney Cox Arquette, each reprising their roles from the first two films. This is the only part of the Scream trilogy not to be written by Kevin Williamson, as he was busy working on his short-lived television series Wasteland. Newcomer Ehren Kruger (writer of the film Arlington Road, who would later go on to write the highly successful screenplays for both The Ring and The Ring Two) was given the task of writing the script based on notes Williamson himself had sketched out.

Plot

Having experienced the trauma of the first two pictures, Campbell's Sidney Prescott character now lives in a secluded area of California where she works as a women's crisis counselor from her home. Her home has a security gate around it and she is now practicly an agoraphobe only leaving her house to walk her pet Golden Retriever (Which she most likely has to act as a guard dog.). Her whereabouts are unknown even to her surviving friends (save for Dewey, played by Arquette, and her father.). Gale Weathers (Cox) has become a largely successful news reporter (of a sensationalist style), thanks to the books she wrote revolving around the murders of the first two films (and subsequent films based on the books).

The film begins when Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber), the man long-ago suspected of killing Sidney's mother, is slaughtered (along with his girlfriend). Suspected of being related to the original killings, Los Angeles police detectives (led by Mark Kincaid, played by Patrick Dempsey) inform Gale Weathers of Weary's murder, asking if she may know anything about a picture found at the murder scene. When she identifies it as a picture of Maureen Prescott, Sidney's mother, it becomes apparent the killings are linked to her murder.


Soon, these actors are systematically killed off in the same order as they are slated to be murdered in the Stab 3 script. Sidney is brought in to help unravel who is behind these killings, but she is barely holding onto her own sanity because of the trauma of past events.

It turns out that Roman (who had faked his own murder) is the killer known as Ghostface, the connection being that he is the son of Sidney's mother (her half-brother). He was born as the result of Sidney's mother being raped during her stint as a B-list movie actress in Hollywood. Gale and her movie counterpart discovered Sid's mother's acting career, which brought forth somewhat of a short-lived friendship, as fake Gale was killed towards the end. Roman tells Sidney that her mother left her father and cheated on him with Hank Loomis, causing Mrs. Loomis to leave her husband. So Roman told Billy Loomis why his mother had left his father, and told him to kill Maureen. Roman also told Billy to have an accomplice that was weak and easily willing to help him out, which turned out to be Stu Macher. Eventually, when Sidney confronts Roman, she "kills" him by shooting him with a gun she sneaked in, but he was wearing a bullet-proof vest. He manages to shoot her in the heart, but she was also wearing a bullet-proof vest (one from the police station), and kills him. As usual, Roman, being the main villain, wasn't really dead and Dewey kills him for real after being told (by Sidney, the only one who knew of Roman's bulletproof vest) to shoot Roman in the head.

Satirical/Self-Referential Style

Once again, Scream 3 uses self-aware characters and generally references itself as a movie most of the time.

Most of the story is set in Hollywood, and focuses on the making of Stab 3, the Scream franchise's parody of itself. For instance, actors (Parker Posey and Matt Keeslar) are playing characters that are actors (Jennifer Jolie and Tom Prinze) playing characters based on Gale and Dewey respectively. There is a constant comparison between the "movie Gale" played by Jennifer and the "real" one.

"Jennifer Jolie" is a combination of Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie. "Angelina Tyler" is a cominbation of Angelina Jolie and Liv Tyler. "Tom Prinze" is a combination of Tom Cruise and Freddie Prinze, Jr. "Tyson Fox" is probably derived from the names of Tyson Beckford and Jamie Foxx.

Jenny McCarthy's character of Sarah complains that she is playing a bit character that is killed off after two scenes. This is exactly what happens to Sarah, and the number of scenes she has in Scream 3.

The characters believe Randy's rules about surviving a trilogy, and by the end even Sidney herself believes she is in a trilogy. Several scenes take place on movie sets which are actually sets of the first film. The climax takes place in a producer's house, with various movie props and filming equipment figuring prominently. Finally, the movie literally ends with "the door being left open" for future installments.

There are also celebrity cameos (Carrie Fisher, Nancy O'Dell, Jay and Silent Bob), and general Hollywood references (Brad Pitt, Connie Chung, Seinfeld, etc).

Cast

The Rules

A signature device, started in Scream and continued in Scream 2 and Scream 3, was the typical "rules" for that type of horror movie being stated by the characters. In Scream 3, Sidney, Dewey, Gale and Randy's sister (Heather Matarazzo), watch a video made by Randy (Jamie Kennedy, in a cameo role) before his death in Scream 2; he states that if the third movie is just another sequel, then the standard rules for a sequel (given in Scream 2) apply. However, "If you find yourself dealing with an unexpected backstory, and a preponderance of exposition, then the sequel rules do not apply. Because you are not dealing with a sequel, you are dealing with the concluding chapter of a trilogy." The rules for the final concluding chapter of a trilogy are different:

  1. "You've got a killer who’s gonna be superhuman. Stabbing him won’t work, shooting him won’t work. Basically in the third one, you gotta cryogenically freeze his head, decapitate him, or blow him up."
  2. "Anyone, including the main character, can die. This means you, Sid."
  3. "The past will come back to bite you in the ass. Whatever you think you know about the past, forget it. The past is not at rest! Any sins you think were committed in the past are about to break out and destroy you."
  4. "Basically... In the third movie? All bets are off."

Cameo appearances

Jay and Silent Bob, the popular characters from Kevin Smith's movies, appear as tourists visiting Sunrise Studios. In the original Scream, a VHS copy of their first film Clerks can be spotted in Stu Macher's house. Kevin Smith would later go on to include Wes Craven in a cameo as the director of a fictitious Scream 4 in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back; in addition, a copy of Scream 3 can be seen in the background of a scene taking place within a video store in Smith's 2004 film Jersey Girl.

Wes Craven makes a cameo dressed as a tourist walking behind Jay and Silent Bob, outside the Stab 3 set.

Carrie Fisher plays Bianca Burnette, an employee of the studio making Stab 3. Talking with Gale, she says that when she was young she tried to win the casting to play Princess Leia, but the role went to a girl who slept with George Lucas.

References to people

  • Gale, played by Courteney Cox, makes mention of Jennifer's relationship with Brad Pitt. In reality, Cox's Friends co-star Jennifer Aniston was married to Pitt. In an ironic twist, Jennifer's last name is Jolie, an obvious reference to Angelina Jolie, the woman Pitt left Aniston for, though some time after the movie was completed.
  • The name on the empty cinematographer's chair on the set of the fictitious Stab 3 is the name of the real film's actual cinematographer, Peter Deming.
  • Jay and Silent Bob, who make an appearance, mistake Gale for TV reporter Connie Chung, when Jay says about Gale, "It's that TV news chick Connie Chung." Also, when Jay and Silent Bob mistake Gale for Connie Chung, they mention Maury Povich to Gale, when Jay asks "Hey, Connie, How's Maury?", right before she gives both of them the finger.
  • Lance Henriksen's director character shares the same name as the famous 17th century English poet John Milton, best known for his epic poem Paradise Lost. Many have drawn similarities between the character in the film with Satan in Paradise Lost.

Music

Untitled

The Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds song "Red Right Hand" is played in the film, having been heard in all three films. Nick Cave actually wrote a "sequel" to the song just for the film, which can be heard in the closing credits. This song features on The Seeds' B-Sides and Rarities. Additionally, Marco Beltrami uses a few notes from the song in his score.

Also, the Creed song "What If" has a video which resembles the happenings of Scream 3, and is featured on the DVD release of the movie. It has a cameo appearance for David Arquette.

Track listing

  1. What If - Creed 5:19
  2. Wait and Bleed - Slipknot 2:32
  3. Suffocate - Finger Eleven 3:50
  4. Spiders - System of a Down 3:36
  5. Automatic - American Pearl 3:34
  6. Fall - Sevendust 5:22
  7. Time Bomb - Godsmack 3:59
  8. Tyler's Song - Coal Chamber 2:51
  9. So Real - Static X 5:42
  10. Crowded Elevator - Incubus 4:44
  11. Debonaire - Dope 2:34
  12. Sunburn - Fuel 4:25
  13. Get on, Get Off - Powerman 5000 3:37
  14. Wanna Be Martyr - Full Devil Jacket 3:23
  15. Dissention - Orgy 3:32
  16. Crawl - Staind 4:32
  17. Click Click - Ear 2000 3:15
  18. Is This the End - Creed 6:15

Reception

The film set a record in its opening weekend for the number of screens in the United States: 3,467. This was later surpassed by Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) with 3,762.

Though the film had a sizeable opening weekend of over $34 million, it was the only entry in the series that failed to gross over $100 million, falling just short at $89 million.

Trivia

  • In the movie Sarah Darling(Jenny McCarthy) says she is upset because "I'm 35 years old playing a 21 year old". Jenny McCarthy was only 28 years old when the movie premiered.
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