Caitlin Browne

Post-Modernism in Scream
Post-modernism is when a group of people choose to change the way in which things are usually done. In the film genre of horror people have decided that instead of following the usual expectations and rules they, in Screams case, highlight the rules and conventions then subtly mock them. By introducing the rules into the film and the characters being aware of them makes the idea of what is happening more realistic and like it could really happen. Throughout the entirety of Scream many classic horror movie conventions are imitated and even mocked. This is why Scream is referred to as post-modern. In Scream the characters are all fully aware of key events and dos and donts of stereotypical horror movies. As well as this there are moments within the film which rely greatly on the audiences prior knowledge of well-known horror films, several props and/or characters refer to previous, famous horror films. For example in one scene the school janitor is dressed like Freddy Krueger from Nightmare on Elm Street (whose name was also Fred), this could be to make the audience think that he is the killer when actually he is not it is another way of imitating previous horror films. It was also the director of both Scream and A Nightmare on Elm Street Wes Craven playing this character.

It is obvious from the opening scene that Scream is not like any previous horror film. The film begins with Casey Becker, played by Drew Barrymore, alone in a large house when she receives several phone calls from the killer. Her character is of a flirtatious cheerleader type and this is shown through the flirty conversation she has with the caller whom she has no idea of their identity. The killer then goes onto reveal her boyfriend tied up in the garden and to save his life she must answer the horror

movie related questions correctly. By doing this Scream is highlighting the fact that teenagers have a thorough knowledge of horror movies and conventions. This also shows that the killer has an extensive knowledge of horror movies as Casey Becker gets one question wrong and was unable to save her boyfriends life. Scream played with the audience making them think that several different people could be the killer for example, one character that could easily be the killer is Randy. Randy could be seen as the killer as he works in a DVD rental store and shows throughout the film that he has knowledge of a lot of horror films as well as the rules and conventions of them. One scene in which his knowledge (and that he is not the killer) is proved is when he is watching a horror movie with friends at a party. He lists all the rules of horror movies to the others after he finds out that none of them know, whilst he is taking it quite seriously none of the others really care and just makes a joke of it. The first rule that Randy states is You can never have sexSex equals death this is ironic because, at this time, Sidney is upstairs with Billy having sex. It becomes clear at the end of this scene that Randy is not the killer as Ghost Face creeps up behind him. In the 1990s it was often referred to as The MTV Generation as TV and MTV were the focus of teenagers lives. Through the film it has been clear that TV and film was at the forefront of peoples minds as in almost every scene there was a TV set, news reporters or a DVD of some sort. This can be closely linked to why and how the teenagers had such knowledge of film genres and the rules of them as they watched TV and films so often. The repeated viewing of these horror movies has resulted in a lack of sympathy and emotion in the teenagers; this can be proved when Tatum says her insides on the outside about Casey Beckers death. By putting it very matter-of-factly it shows that Tatum doesnt really know how to be sensitive about what has happened.