A year after the killings in Woodsboro, Ghostface has returned.
A movie based on the original tragedy, Stab, is shooting up the box office and becoming a massive pop culture phenomenon.
Someone is determined to make a sequel to Stab happen, and whoever it is wants the original final girl Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) back in the middle of the action…
“These days it’s all about the trial”
Released a year later, Scream 2 is drenched in its predecessor’s success and the celluloid equivalent of a nervous sweat, the speed of its production emanating from every frame.
This is a film made by successful people who have not had the time to analyse why it worked the first time. That energy, on top of a great script and deft direction, make Scream 2 a superior sequel.
We start with another iconic pre-title scene, that takes the theme of multiple layers of mediation hinted at in the original and makes this a dominant part of the text.
Throughout the film, characters and viewers are forced to engage with versions of themselves and assumptions around the importance of representation.
The opening sequence - a movie theatre playing the film-within-a-film Stab - replays the opening scene from the first film on screen while a black couple (Jada Pinkett Smith and Omar Epps) debate the movie’s conventions, and offers a direct critique to the all-white casting of the original, and the convention of black characters dying early in horror movies.
The movie Stab feels like a comment on the sensationalism of murder in new media, particularly when the victim shown is one we are familiar with as a real person in this film’s diegesis (Drew Barrymore’s Casey as played by Heather Graham in Stab).
That doubling and playing on expectations continues through the movie in ways overt (Randy’s class debating the quality of sequels) and subtle (even the blocking of the ensemble at the start of the main action, replicating a similar scene from the original, feels like an attempt to frame the new cast into the moulds of their predecessors).
The film’s remediation also becomes a way for characters to dig deeper into themselves and their relationships with each other - this is particularly obvious in the evolution of callus reporter Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox) and former Sheriff’s deputy Dewey Riley (David Arquette).
In the first Scream, Gale played on Dewey’s feelings for her to support her investigation.
Since their story has been captured and revised in Gale’s book on the case, Dewey has become more introspective and self-aware. In quoting her work back at her, Dewey also forces Gale to reconsider herself.
In a more comical spin on the idea, Dewey and Gale finally acknowledge their mutual attraction by replaying footage of their argument earlier in the film.
In watching the franchise, Dewey is a fascinating character - he is the only major character to carry the physical trauma from film to film.
With a limp and restricted mobility of his hand, Dewey is notable as a relatively unsentimental portrayal of a disabled character. While Dewey is clumsy and a bit slow on the uptake, he is never made fun of for his impairments, and despite his injuries, the films are not afraid of putting him in more peril..
His dynamic with Gale is also interesting - while Dewey is a cop with a gun, he is never presented as a typical action hero. Gale is the one who is aggressive and single-minded, while Dewey is more considerate and thoughtful. Their love scene is a comic play on the familiar cliche of romantic fiction - Gale picks up Dewey and puts him on the table to make out.
Whereas the other characters have overtly changed between the films, Gale is even more determined to pursue her professional goals.
This film cements the casting of Liev Schreiber as the wrongfully convicted Cotton Weary - his ambiguity and size as a performer works for a character who is either malignant or on the edge.
While all the films are about the remediation of violence, this film’s characters are obsessed with look and presentation.
The killer Mickey (Randy’s dark twin) is a movie obsessive who is going to blame the movies for his killing spree. He is still an audience member, excited at the potential drama of the trial.
At the end Gale is transformed - when her cameraman Joel (Duane Martin) returns and hands her a microphone, he has to remind her who she is (“You’re Gale Weathers”), who she used to be.
The film boasts three bravura suspense sequences: Randy’s death scene; Gale and Dewey being stalked through the bowels of the film department; Sidney and her roommate Hallie (Elise Neal) trapped in the police car with a comatose Ghostface. The scene of Sidney trying to climb over Ghostface’s motionless body - to get out through the window - is superb tension-building.
Ed Gerrard was responsible for adding segments from Hans Zimmer’s score from Broken Arrow (featuring Duane ‘Rebel Rouser’ Eddy’s twangy guitar) to create a new theme for Dewey. These borrowed elements work well for Dewey, giving him a goofy, Western-inflected dignity.
Scarier, funnier and more ambitious than its predecessor, Scream 2 is - despite/because of its critique of sequels - a great second chapter in the series.
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