Scream

The real miracle of Scream may be that for all its footnotes and cleverness, it plays as a film its Randy the Nerd would love.

No one will ever consider Wes Craven's Scream Oscar fodder, but this funny and scary little experiment in terror from the man who invented "Nightmare on Elm Street" puts some fun back into a very tired genre.

By the time Scream arrives at its final twist, Craven has done too many contortions of his own to give the finale much shock value.

The picture is so full of cross-references, self-mockery and movies within movies (including a stalking that's recorded on video) that it can't help turning into a precious two-hour in-joke.

Scream builds to a splattering finale that should leave genre fans highly satisfied. Here's one of the year's better thrillers.

Scream may be a cut above the gore fests that line the dimly lit back wall at your video store, but it is a far cry from genre classics like Halloween or Craven's own Nightmare On Elm Street.

What makes Scream so successful is that it balances fun with horror in a way that had the audience looking back to the genre films that they loved with fondness.

Even as the sequels get bigger and bigger, the inventiveness of this first one will stand the test of time.

After several sequels, including years of repetitive plotting and increasingly elaborate backstory piled onto the Scream franchise, [the original's] bravura first scene still leaves audiences gasping for air.

That is the genius of Scream. It’s a film that keeps the suspense and terror associated with other slashers, while obliterating the misogynistic rules of those films. It’s meticulously crafted, and after all these years, it’s still a masterpiece.