Wes Craven’s latest horror effort Scream 4 will hit screens nationwide in less than twenty-four hours. It has been over a decade since the last installment of Scream was released – Scream 3 – in 2000 – but the effects that the post-modern series has had on the horror genre is still being felt today. Will Scream 4 have the same paradigm shifting affect on the genre as it’s progenitor?
In 1972, Wes Craven teamed with Sean Cunningham to create The Last House on the Left on a very meager budget of $90,000. Last House on the Left was originally rated X by the MPAA. Sean Cunningham acquired an official “R” rated greenband and slapped it on the front of the film without approval from the MPAA. The film went on to spawn countless imitators and wound up being banned in Australia and the UK and earned it’s infamous reputation several times over. In 2009, Craven’s first film was remade as a much slicker production and went on to make over $45 million worldwide.
In 1984, Wes Craven was stuck with a script that had been rejected by every studio in Hollywood until Bob Shaye at 
New Line cinema gave him the green-light. Craven’s movie about a child murderer that kills teens in their sleep was entitled A Nightmare on Elm Street and the killer named Freddy Kruger went on to become a cultural icon that haunted children’s nightmares for the next twenty-five years. A Nightmare On Elm Street went on to become one of the most successful franchises of all time, reinvigorating New Line Cinema and breathing fresh breath into the waning slasher subgenre. ANOES was remade in 2010 starring Jackie Earle Haley from a less than stellar script and left fans wishing the nightmare had ended long ago.
In 1996, the horror genre was all but dead, having been driven into the ground by mindless sequels that chose pop culture sensibilities over quality stories and new ideas. Craven teamed with writer Kevin Williamson to create Scream, a tale of teens plagued by a killer that was obsessed with horror movies. Scream revitalized the horror genre and kickstarted the slasher genre by infusing it with a post-modern self aware sensibility. Scream went on to gross over $173 million worldwide and spawned two sequels each one grossing nearly $200 million worldwide. Two sequels that is – until now.
This weekend, Craven and Williamson revisit the franchise that once saved horror from obscurity. Will the latest installment of the Scream series have the same effect? It’s unrealistic to expect paradigm shifting films on every outing from a filmmaker – so here’s to hoping that Scream 4 is just a good slasher film that will scare the crap out of us and leave us hoping for more.
For his dedication to the craft of filmmaking and by leading the way from guerrilla filmmaking in obscurity to helming the highest grossing horror films of the year, Wes Craven has been chosen as MVP’s Inspirational Filmmaker of the Week! Craven’s resume is filled with massive hits that changed the horror genre forever as well as quiet gems that slipped by almost unnoticed such as The Serpent and the Rainbow, The People Under the Stairs, A New Nightmare, and Red Eye. Craven has shown us time and again that all it takes to make a good horror film is a good idea and the vision to see it through to the end.
