Analysis Of The Scream Franchise

PRESENTER- My chosen auteur for this research project is Wes Craven, with a focus on how he is a pioneer within the horror genre. [CHANGE SLIDE 1] PRESENTER- : Wesley ‘Wes’ Earl Craven was born in Cleveland, Ohio on August 2nd, 1939 and died August 30th, 2015 in Los Angeles, California. Craven began teaching English/ Humanities at university however later left the education sector to become an adult film director. Pulling from his experience in the adult film industry, Craven created his first feature film as director with ‘The Last House on the Left’ which was released in 1972. From here Craven directed countless blockbusters, mainly horror, including 'The Hills Have Eyes' (1977) and 'The People Under The Stairs' (1991). As well as becoming

* Show introductory clip of the Scream franchise (Item 3). PRESENTER- To summarise, Scream is based upon the idea that in a rural town called Woodsboro there is a killer who bases his murders on scary movies. The killer, known as ‘Ghostface’, stalks then murders his victims after taunting them with questions about films from the horror genre. [CHANGE SLIDE 6] PRESENTER- Scream's core theme is the idea of meta-textual postmodernism, it suggests that the film is self-aware, it often uses horror clichés to poke fun at the events occurring within the film and comments upon other real life horror films such as ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’or ‘Halloween’. The fact that Scream constantly indulges the clichés that it references is a sign of its self-awareness. For example characters within Scream went against their apparent stereotypes and were shown to be self aware i.e Dewy and Gale purposely go against how the spectators would imagine them to be. This breaks the boundaries between the film and the

[CHANGE SLIDE 16] * Show clip of Scream’s final scene (Item 8) [CHANGE SLIDE 17] PRESENTER- The clip of Scream’s final scene shows Billy and Stu telling Sidney that they must survive because “these days you gotta have a sequel”, this pushes spectators to question the entire dynamics of the predictability of the film as up until this point horror films have very rarely commented upon a future beyond this current film. [CHANGE SLIDE 18] PRESENTER- Craven has been doing postmodern meta horror since, 1994, when he made another one of his most notable films, Wes Craven’s New Nightmare. Both Scream and New Nightmare explore the idea of merging horror films and real life. Although while Scream appealed to huge audiences, New Nightmare gathered a smaller, fan-led cult following. [CHANGE SLIDE 19] PRESENTER- New Nightmare was a creative and artistic success and a climax in Cravens career. [CHANGE SLIDE 20] * Show the trailer for New Nightmare (Item 9). [CHANGE SLIDE 21] PRESENTER- Craven’s works often studies of the nature of reality. New Nightmare touches upon the fourth wall, which means acknowledging or doing something to the audience through a camera, by having actress Heather Langenkamp and others play themselves as they are haunted by the