Magazine Analysis 3

Film review for scream- by Kiran tariq

Film review annotation:


This review is from the bbc and in written in a formal context .The review introduces the film by talikng about what effect it had when it first got released." . It appeared to be clever, dangerous, witty, and fresh, but it sadly became victim to the movies it mocked, even before it had ended this quote from the review suggest that the film was different nd was smart but due to the previous failures of the other films it had be judged  even before its release.The review tends to focus more on the narrative of the film as it tals about what happens in the film and the different stages of the film in a quite detail. The review uses standard english and doesnt use complicated words. At the top of the review it is given  a rating , their are two types of ratings the reviewers rating and the users rating this is for the audience to see what rating the people  have given to the review.

By kiran tariq

Magazine Review from Sight & Sound

By: MAK

Magazine review from Total Film

By: Adorena, Mya & Kiran

Adorena- Scream 2 review from BBC

Reviewed by Neil Smith

Everyone who survived "Scream" came back for the second instalment in Wes Craven's tongue-in-cheek slasher trilogy, which - just as the first movie had mocked the conventions of the horror genre - pokes fun at the clichés of Hollywood sequels.
Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) is now in college, where she is studying drama, dating Derek (Jerry O'Connell), and trying to put the Woodsboro murders far behind her. Unfortunately a movie based on the killings - "Stab" - is about to open, despite the fact that two unwary teens were butchered at the first preview.
In no time at all a new crop of victims are attracting the attention of the knife-wielding psycho in the ghost mask, among them Buffy star Sarah Michelle Gellar. Luckily, Sydney and her pals have the assistance of movie nerd Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy), who tutors them in the ways of the sequel.
According to Randy, the body count in a sequel is always bigger and the deaths always more elaborate - rules that screenwriter Kevin Williamson takes to heart in a bloodsoaked follow-up that leaves few of the cast unscathed.
While the shocks come thick and fast, the real pleasure comes from the knowing humour and ingenious spoofing of genre tropes. There's even a nod back to the first film, in which Sidney jokingly remarked that, if a movie were made about her, she'd probably be played by Tori Spelling. And guess who plays Sidney in "Stab"?

Annotation of Review

The language in this review is formal.

Adorena; Scream 2- Movie Reveiw From ROTTEN TOMATOES

I truly hope that Scream 2 proves to all of the doubters that horror movies are not all the same. They are not all equally bad, and by God, they are not all equally good. However, they don't get any better than Scream 2, the terrific sequel to the hit blockbuster w2hich grossed $100 mil. and is credited to reviving the horror genre. And while the original Scream(***) played almost like a straight out satire, it's sequel is more concerned with looking good, and it succeeds with flying colors. Scream 2 is the most technically accomplished horror picture yet. There are two scenes here which are the best and most well-made that I've seen in any slasher flick.
While I won't reveal any crucial plot details, I will tell you this; Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell, playing the character with he most unappealing personality) is being spooked again, by a copycat killer who wants to recreate the "legendary" Woodsboro murders (the subject of the original Scream). Gale Weathers, the sleazy tabloid reporter has written a book about the murders which has been turned into a movie called "Stab". It is at a sneak preview of that movie where the first slaying occurs.
From there on out, Scream 2 is a frightening and frighteningly smart slasher flick. Smart slasher flick? Saying that leaves a sour taste in my mouth, but the saying fits well, as the movie works in almost every respect. It has a wonderful cast (enter - Courtney Cox and David Arquette), style, wit (counting every possible way in which sequels suck and then not making a sequel that sucks), and most importantly scars. Yes, if jolts are what you are looking for, this film has them aplenty, thanks to Wes Craven who has a flair for scaring with the most obvious things. The movie, despite all of its jokes sets a very eerie atmosphere.
No, Scream 2 is not perfect. The ending is weak and too long. However, it's nice to know that the Scream franchise doesn't suffer from sequelphobia. It has produced the first superior sequel since the Star Wars saga, which got better as it went. I doubt that Scream 3 which is bound to surface late this year will surpass Scream 2. If it does, however, the Scream trilogy will rank right up there with Star Wars

Annotation of review
The language used in this revew is both formal and informal as the writer speaks informally at times but he also speaks formally. For example when the wirtter says "I won't reveal any crucial plot details", h is being formal, however when he says "counting every possible way in which sequels suck and then not making a sequel that sucks" he is being informal.
The writertalks about te baic storyline of the film, he gives the reader a taste of what the movie Scream 2 is like. He breifly tells the reader about the opening sequence and ow the movie carries on from that point. "Gale Weathers, the sleazy tabloid reporter has written a book about the murders which has been turned into a movie called "Stab". It is at a sneak preview of that movie where the first slaying occurs." "Sidney is being spooked again, by a copycat killer who wants to recreate the "legendary" Woodsboro murders". The reviewer describes the film in a posetive attitude as he states that the movie is a "smart slasher flick". However he does not state that the movie is the best sequel as he states that "Scream 2 is not perfect. The ending is weak and too long" which shows the reviews opinion on the film is average.

Film review for scream - by Kiran Tariq

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    Film review by WenQing

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Directed by : Wes Craven
Written by : Kevin Williamson
Principal Cast : Neve Campbell (Sidney), Skeet Ulrich (Billy), Matthew Lillard (Stuart), Courteney Cox (Gale Weathers), Rose McGowan (Tatum), Jamie Kennedy (Randy)
Produced by : Dimension Films
Length : 104 minutes
Rating : *** 1/2
Theatres : Cathay Cinemas
All things considered, SCREAM is really quite good. There's an adequate (an understatement) amount of blood, gore, and unsavoury gutting and on-screen killing. There's also plenty of shock value (at least the preview audience seemed to find mountains of it, screaming at every relevant juncture), but it wasn't too scary (for desensitised me anyway).
SCREAM is really about Sidney Prescott -- played by Neve Campbell who seems to have a "Party of Five" hangover (especially the crying scenes and snatches of teen angst) -- her boyfriend Billy, and a killer in the town dressed as the Grim Reaper. Sidney i s a disturbed teenager whose mother was raped and murdered brutally a year before. Her boyfriend Billy is suspected to be the blade-happy killer, and the plot goes from a cameo Drew Barrymore being slaughtered (and hung from a tree with all her insides da ngling from her stomach) in the first few minutes, to a festival of killings in the protracted finale, with practically all the teens in town boozing and watching horror movies all night in Stuart's house (and getting picked off one by one of course). The re's also an attached plot of Gale Weathers, a reporter bent on covering the sensational series of killings (she wrote a book about the murder of Sidney's mom a year ago... so you can guess Sidney doesn't like her much), which sneakily plugs Courteney Cox into the centre of the movie with Campbell and Ulrich.
What makes SCREAM just that little bit more flashy is the irreverent respect it has for the horror-slasher-epic genre it's swimming in. Sidney sums it up aptly, saying horror movies are "all the same... some big-breasted blonde who can't act" getting her self directly in harm's way like a moth to a flame. SCREAM takes all the conventions made popular and easily identifiable by horror "classics" like HALLOWEEN and FRIDAY THE 13TH (and of course Craven's own A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET) and twists them into a freaky homage to all these slasher epics. Some characters in SCREAM are self-referential, expounding on how they must be in "one great big movie," and how each event is reminiscent of a horror flick convention. The centre of this revelation is Jamie Kenn edy's character Randy (who works in a video store... echoes of Tarantino?) who declares that there are three basic rules to surviving a horror flick, striking home with deadly wit, comic effect and aplomb : never have sex (virgins always live through the movie), never drink alcohol, and never say: "I'll be right back" (because surely they never will).
The special thing about SCREAM is that it never descends into becoming just a plain silly self-effacing film... even as Randy describes each golden rule of horror films, they are being broken with grisly results. It's almost a sophisticated satire of the genre (almost- but that bit tacky because the conclusion to SCREAM is a little bit of a cop-out), yet maintaining the balance of the thriller so as to keep the action compelling, and the shocks stinging enough to be effective.
Even though convincing acting is rarely a part of horror flicks, SCREAM has quite a good cast. There are stand-out performances (within the dramatic restrictions of a horror film!) from Rose McGowan and Jamie Kennedy, both of whom are quite likeable and fun to watch. There's also Matthew Lillard (HACKERS) who is just plain crazy in SCREAM, and who is more convincing as an unadulterated nutcase (read : acts weird for no apparent reason) than Courteney Cox and Neve Campbell as dramatic leads put together.
But there were some problems I had with SCREAM. While it was altogether an enjoyable movie, with lots of twists and turns as to the identity of the killer, and really suspenseful action sequences (kudos to Craven), there are several weaknesses I could no t blink away. Somehow, I can't forget the disturbing fear that Freddy Kreuger represented in the original NIGHTMARE (before he became the over-used and very visible clown in the NIGHTMARE sequels). In SCREAM our Grim Reaper is not supernatural (fair enoug h, just plain human), but so very human that his victims consistently punch and kick him where it hurts (so he groans in pain) and they close doors on his arms (and he can't get in because he's just a human being anyway). Somehow, the killer's humanity be comes the undoing of how much we fear him. Similarly, the body count is spectacular, and the killings on screen so explicit (with the censors having a field day with the early gutting scene) that desensitising me was just another blood-bath away. There wa s too much carnage to really turn the killer's work into an anomaly in the normal life of common teens, the anomaly that forms the basis of fear- the unknown and uncertain unnaturalness of things.
These two things (including the cop-out ending which I can't reveal because it would spoil the ride) made the killer too ordinary and the grisly murders so commonplace that SCREAM became a flashy, clever gimmick of a flick. It was a thriller with a witty and comic twist in its in-joke treatment of the horror film genre, plenty of style in execution, but somehow lacking the convincing element of fear that made the original NIGHTMARE outstanding (except for its own strangely incongruous ending after the eff ective build up).
All in all, SCREAM comes across as very competent and quite smart. Not very scary but lots of shocks and gore to compensate. Craven is finding a new way to make his horror films, but SCREAM is as far as this self-referential sub-genre can go. I gave SCRE AM lots of stars because it's done better than any horror flick I've seen in the past 5 years (I've even caught TCS' "Tuesdays After Dark" features and its precursor "Terrifying Tuesdays" quite avidly). SCREAM's not perfect but it's really quite good.

film review annotation- Scream

The film review by WenQing is wriiten in a formal text and has alot of detail of the storyline of the film., it talks about the differeent stages of the film starting with the first stage were the first victim"Kacey" was brutley murderd and the hung from a tree in her back garden and then goes on to talk about the party that the teenagers had at the end.The review enagages the target audience of  mostly teenagers by using language such as  " amount of blood, gore, and unsavoury gutting and on-screen killing." This line suggest that it is for a teenage audience as it decribes the action in more simplier terms in other words it doesnt really use complex words. The layout of the film review is formal it has the main detaild of the film written at the top of the page which makes it easier to understand the film it also uses images to attract the target audience of teenagers so that they dont only have writing to read but have pictures which link to the writing and make it easier for the target audience to understand the film. This film review mostly focuses on the storyline of the film  as it talks about the different stages of the film in some detail. The film review also tals about what make the film "Scream" different from the horror films " What makes SCREAM just that little bit more flashy is the irreverent respect it has for the horror-slasher-epic genre it's swimming in" This line tells us as audience what makes  flm unique and differnt from the other horror films in other words you could say its trying to persuade the audience to watch the film by telling them that it is different and unique.

It also tells the audience the techniques the film uses to make the film different and unique   " The special thing about SCREAM is that it never descends into becoming just a plain silly self-effacing film... even as Randy describes each golden rule of horror films, they are being broken with grisly results."

Film review for scream-by Kiran Tariq

Review byMike Oliveri

It's not often that a movie comes along and sparks a whole new outlook on its genre, but SCREAM did just that. Several hip teenage slasher flicks surfed the wake of its success, putting a Generation X stamp on the characters and hiring teenage prime time drama icons to portray them.

And it's ironic, because SCREAM, written by Kevin Williamson Kevin Smith (I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, THE FACULTY), is essentially a parody of slasher flicks. During the course of the movie, the characters lambast "traditional" horror films such as FRIDAY THE 13TH or HALLOWEEN, yet the plot of SCREAM itself follows the formula almost exactly, essentially showing us exactly what the characters were talking about.

Our heroine is high school senior Sidney Prescott (Neve Cambell: SCREAM 2). Previous to events in the film, Sid's mother is murdered and the man she was having an affair with, Cotton Weary Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber: SPHERE, PHANTOMS) is sent to prison for life for the crime thanks to Sid's court testimony.

When a killer strikes Woodsboro and slaughters Casey Backer (Drew Barrymore: ALTERED STATES, FIRESTARTER, CAT'S EYE) and her boyfriend, the community is gripped by fear. Sid's father reluctantly leaves town on a business trip, and soon after Sid receives strange phone calls from the killer, who knows a little too much about Sid's mother.

The killer claims more victims, including the high school principal (cameo by Henry Winkler), and continues to stalk Sid in his spare time. In an act of defiance, the group of friends throws a party, only to have the killer attack there as well.

When the sheriff is killed, the local deputy Dewey Riley (David Arquette: BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, SCREAM, RAVENOUS) is left to handle the investigations, and at the same time has to keep nosy reporter Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox: SCREAM 2, SCREAM 3) away from the murder scene.

I could fill you in on more of the plot, but it's really just more formulaic chase-and-kill on behalf of the killer. Yet somehow Director Wes Craven (DEADLY BLESSING, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, THE PEOPLE UNDER THE STAIRS, and much more) manages to make a lot of it look fresh and new. Some may attribute it to the fresh young faces or to the updated camera techniques, but I'd say it's mostly the writing. While the killer on the phone plot device was used more effectively in BLACK CHRISTMAS, the almost seductive quality of the killer's voice (Roger L. Jackson: MARS ATTACKS!) in SCREAM gives it a different appeal and suits the tone of the film. Some of the murders are typical (Barrymore's short-lived role), while others are fairly clever (keep an eye on the news cameraman in the van).

Perhaps the best part of the writing, however, is the way in which different characters are made out to be suspects. Rather than a big creepy guy or a supernatural entity chasing down the kids, we know the killer is human and probably someone close to Sid. It could be film fanatic Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy: ENEMY OF THE STATE), the know-it-all that applies the rules of horror filmdom to the murders. It could be the asshole of the bunch, the excitable Stuart Macher (Matthew Lillard: GHOULIES 3, THE CURVE). And it could even be Sid's sensitive-but-tough boyfriend, Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich: THE CRAFT, TAKEDOWN). Even Sid's father is implicated at one point (though I have to wonder if anyone really ever believed he'd turn out to be the killer).

Overall a good flick with some thrills and even a dash of dark humor. The action is intense, and the ending, if somewhat predictable by the time you get there, is entertaining. It set the new trend for a reason. I give it four shriek girls.

Film review annotation

The languge used for this film review is generlly formal. The film review  talks about the storyline of the film scream in alot of detail, it talks about the diiferent aspects of the films and talks about the murderes that happened and tells the audience of what they thought of the murders. It talss about how some of the murders were easy to guess and some were really clever.. It sort of compliments the reader by saying things such as" it's really just more formulaic chase-and-kill on behalf of the killer. Yet somehow Director Wes Craven (DEADLY BLESSING, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, THE PEOPLE UNDER THE STAIRS, and much more) manages to make a lot of it look fresh and new" . This line suggests that even though the film has typical conventions that can be easy to guess the director gives the film a new and unique style which makes the film "Scream" different from the other horror films.The review i think focuses more on the plot of the film and the actors, because it talks alot about the plot in some detail and also talks about the actors invovled in the film and makes references to the other successfull films the actors and the director has been apart of  in order to make the film look good. The film review targets the target audienece of 15-24 olds it does this by using standard english and not using complicated words  and it also m akes references to other films and other characters so that it is easier for the target audience to understand and trys to persuade them to watch the film..It also states the actors clearly and then makes atleast one reference to any other film or drama they have been part of this is a good technique because if some one like a specific actor for example "David Arquette" the audience will see his name stated and will be drawn to watch the film as they are his fans.