Anna Faris and Regina Hall are back as the lovable, dim-witted Cindy Campbell and her self-serving, sex-crazed pal Brenda respectively. They are joined this time around by Craig Bierko as the cute, but utterly clueless, Tom Ryan. Together, they battle to save the world from a ruthless alien invasion. Cindy Campbell moves in next to Tom Ryan because she's taking care of an old lady. She finds out the house is haunted by a little boy and goes on a quest to find out who killed him and why. Also, Alien "Tr-iPods" are invading the world and Cindy has to uncover the secret in order to stop them.
:::>^..^<::: ~*~The Journey is more important than the end or the start~*~ :::>^..^<:::
Director: David Zucker
Stars: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, Andre Benjamin (Full Cast)
Studio: Weinstein Company, The
The Plot: It's up to Cindy Campbell (Faris) to save the world from a Tr-Ipod attack on Earth.
THE BUZZ: The general consensus seems to be that Scary Movie 3 "sux," and the first two installments "rool." So the battle lines will be drawn as both sides enter theaters to see the latest (and probably not the last?) chapter in the jacked-up lives of Cindy Campbell and Brenda Meeks (yeah, she's back). This time around, superhero and horror films are skewered.
:::>^..^<::: ~*~The Journey is more important than the end or the start~*~ :::>^..^<:::
Friday, April 14, 2006; Posted: 8:51 a.m. EDT (12:51 GMT)
(Entertainment Weekly) -- If the "Scary" franchise continues beyond "Scary Movie 4" -- and there's no reason to think it won't, so long as the universe keeps providing such spoof-ready pop-cultural phenomena as "Saw," "The Grudge," and Tom Cruise's lovestruck gymnastics on Oprah's couch -- then here's a modest proposal: Enforce a one-term limit on whichever auteur de junque is entrusted with "Scary" 5, 6, 7, or 13.
That way, not only would more artistes get to play in the game (I've got a hankering to see what Baz Luhrmann would do with the form, in full "Moulin Rouge" twirl) but audiences would be spared the diminishing returns bred of overfamiliarity with a genre that's hit-or-miss to begin with. (One man's Chris Elliott-as-"Village"-idiot snot joke is another woman's look-at-the-wristwatch moment.)
All this is my way of saying that just as the Wayans brothers' "Scary Movie 2" was a duller model than their original "Scary Movie," so David Zucker's "Scary Movie 4" offers nothing we didn't see in his "Scary Movie 3" -- except, perhaps, the uncomfortable sight of Dr. Phil trying to mock the unbearable lightness of being Dr. Phil while Shaquille O'Neal peddles his Shaq-ness.
The plot (what plot?) solves the mystery of a haunted house, a ghost boy, and an alien invasion, stumbling goofily from punchline to punchline; the "Brokeback Mountain" joke with two black cowboys (Anthony Anderson and Kevin Hart) defending their heterosexuality while reaching for lubricants was tired four months ago.
I bow to reliably funny franchise princesses Anna Faris, as resilient heroine Cindy Campbell, and Regina Hall, as Cindy's horny pal, Brenda. (Faris, a "Brokeback" cast member for real, now gamely bathes Cloris Leachman with a bucket of fake urine in the name of hilarity.) But I wonder when the pair might want to relinquish their whoopee-cushioned thrones. (Craig Bierko plays "War of the Worlds' " Tom Ryan playing Faris' next-door neighbor and boyfriend. And a fine crazyperson he makes bouncing on Oprah's furniture with Cruise-y mania, too.)
As ever, the criteria for mockworthiness have less to do with the scariness of the source material (or, for that matter, the precision of the joke bombs) than a certain self-seriousness expressed in an easily identifiable production design that's ripe for loving cannibalization.
Zucker and his crew (including scripters Craig Mazin and Jim Abrahams) have fun with the working-class housing in "War of the Worlds" (and Dakota Fanning's gumdrop-colored wardrobe), the dour landscape in "The Village," and the accursed little stool that signals tragedy in the ring in "Million Dollar Baby." They just don't have much to say about the movies they mock.
And as ever, the jokes are a jumble of the gross, the baggy, the raunchy, the mistimed, and -- every once in a while -- the refreshingly incorrect. The scariest moment in "Scary Movie 4" involves Zucker veteran Leslie Nielsen, playing his patented bumbling President Harris: While the U.S. is under attack, this yutz sits in a chair at an elementary school, raptly listening to a kid read a book about a pet animal.
EW Grade: C+
:::>^..^<::: ~*~The Journey is more important than the end or the start~*~ :::>^..^<:::
I watched this last night. It wasn't bad, I guess. On the same level as Scary Movie 4, really, but I think it relied too heavily on current news for its laughs... unfortunately, in a few years the whole thing with Tom Cruise and Oprah won't really be that funny.
But the scene with the President in the classroom being told about the alien invasion and wanted to hear the rest of the story was awesome. As was the blind woman in the village doing her business in the town meeting.
Also funny was the Japanese real-estate guy trying to cover up the mystic signs of the ghost inhabiting the house at the beginning. Seeing him in that bathtub was just too funny. There was one scene with this kid and the main chick speaking Japanese to one another, but it was just crap like "Kodac Sony Mitsubishi Sushimi!!!" with subtitles.
"I'm for it so we can put Nuclear power plants up there, and then beam the power back to earth on a laser beam." ~ Whidden
04-11-2006 03:35 AM
