90s Movie Review - Scream

Director: Wes Craven
Genre: Horror/ Thriller
Runtime: 111 minutes
Year: 1996
Starring: Neve Campbell, David Arquette, Courtney Cox, Rose McGowan, Skeet Ulrich, Matthew Lillard, Jamie Kennedy, Drew Barrymore, Henry Winkler

Description: A masked killer begins murdering teenagers in a small town, and as the body count rises, one girl and her friends contemplate the "rules" of horror films as they find themselves living in a real-life one.
Review: Director Wes Craven has been a specialist in the horror genre. Classics as “The Last House on the Left”, “The Hills Have Eyes” and “Nightmare on Elm Street” are some of the movies that shine on his résumé. Half way through the nineties, he decided to mock his favorite genre, by making “Scream”. This film is unique in its genre, because it manages to scare the viewer, but also make you laugh. “Scream” was an unexpected success and later more movies in the subgenre of so called ‘slasher movies’ followed.
“Scream” has an almost classic opening scene, where we see student Casey Becker preparing for a movie night. She gets a call from a man who apparently dialed the wrong number. Soon Casey realizes it’s a psychopath who wants to play a morbid game of life and death. When she and her boyfriend get killed, all the students at the high school are interviewed. The attentions goes out to Sidney Prescott, whose mother was murdered a year ago. Sidney is eventually the target of the killer.
The great thing about “Scream” is, that it doesn’t take itself too seriously. The characters talk about all the clichés horror movies have and with that Wes Craven separates himself from other horror directors. “Scream” is in my opinion not really a horror movie, it’s not scary enough. But it’s very entertaining and fun.

Rating: 3,5/ 5

100 Movie Challenge 2017 - # 27: Night Shift

Director: Ron Howard
Genre: Comedy
Runtime: 106 minutes
Year: 1982
Starring: Henry Winkler, Michael Keaton, Shelley Long, Clint Howard

Description: A morgue attendant (Henry Winkler) is talked into running a brothel at his workplace after a deceased pimp is sent there. However, the pimp's killers don't look too kindly on this new 'business', nor does the morgue's owner.

Review: “Night Shift” will not be in the AFI’s top 100 list, but it is funny. Chuck works in a morgue. His friend Bill talks him into running a brothel at his workplace, after a deceased pimp is sent there. Silly story, but pretty original if you ask me.
Why is this movie funny? I got two words: Michael Keaton! He is hilarious. His character Bill is very annoying, but Keaton made him loveable. Henry Winkler is okay and so is Shelley Long, but the constantly stand in Keaton’s shadow.
The plot is a bit silly, like I stated before. And the film targets a 17 to 25 year old male audience. “Night Shift” probably doesn’t hold up as well, its typical eighties humor.

Rating: 3/ 5

100 Movie Challenge 2016 - # 49: Little Nicky

Director: Steven Brill
Genre: Comedy
Runtime: 90 minutes
Year: 2000
Starring: Adam Sandler, Harvey Keitel, Patricia Arquette, Rhys Ifans, Rodney Dangerfield, Reese Witherspoon, Michael McKean, Rob Schneider, Henry Winkler, Peter Dante, Alan Covert, Kevin Nealon, Dana Carvey, Jon Lovitz

Description: After two of the devil's three sons escape Hell to wreak havoc on Earth, the devil (Harvey Keitel) must send his third son, the mild-mannered Nicky (Adam Sandler), to bring them back before it's too late.

Review: Adam Sandler doesn’t have the best reputation, but he has made some great memorable comedies like “Billy Madison”, “The Wedding Singer” and “Happy Gilmore”. “Little Nicky” unfortunately isn’t one of them.
Sandler plays one of Satan’s three sons, who has to stop his two other borhters from creating a battlefield on Earth. This character, Nicky, has a major speech impediment and is actually a more kind hearted guy.
The movie is filled with bad jokes and there is way too much going on. Sandler’s jokes are often bad, but bearable and still funny. Here in “Little Nicky” I didn’t really laugh a lot and I was a bit annoyed with the film.
“Little Nicky” is probably one of Sandler’s worst films.

Rating: 1/ 5