Scream 4 (2011)

Scream 4 (styled as SCRE4M) is a 2011 American slasher film written by Kevin Williamson and directed by Wes Craven. It is the fourth film in the Scream series, preceded by Scream 3. The film stars Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, and David Arquette, all reprising their roles as Sidney Prescott, Gale Weathers, and Dewey Riley respectively.

Rumors of a sequel have been floating around since the premiere of this film, but nothing has been confirmed as of yet. After the passing of Scream creator Wes Craven it seems unlikely a next installment will happen.

Ten years have passed, and Sidney Prescott, who has put herself back together thanks in part to her writing, is visited by the Ghostface Killer.

Plot
On the fifteenth anniversary of the original Woodsboro murders by Billy Loomis and Stu Macher, two high school girls, Jenny and Marnie, debate the quality of the dwindling Stab series after watching the opening scene of Stab VII. Jenny goes upstairs to try and prank Marnie. She attempts the Ghostface voice, but reveals herself by laughing before Marnie mysteriously goes silent. Her voice is replaced by that of the real Ghostface, who taunts Jenny, until she steps in near the front door. Marnie's bloodied corpse flies through the glass and Ghostface chases Jenny into the renovated garage. This is where she is stabbed and partially crushed by a falling automated garage door before being stabbed again. The following morning Sheriff Dewey Riley is awakened by his cell phone and he's called down to the main street of town to sort out a prank involving Ghostface costumes being put on the lamp posts. Dewey arrives to find his deputy, Judy Hicks, waiting. They share saucy banter over Judy's lemon squares, while Dewey receives a call about the murders of Jenny and Marnie.

Meanwhile local teenager. Kirby Reed, picks up Sidney Prescott's younger cousin, Jillian Roberts, and her friend, Olivia Morris, who lives next door. Jillian gets a weird, threatening call from Ghostface using from Jenny's phone and Olivia reveals, that she got a similar call from Marnie's phone earlier that morning. They arrive at school, flocked by film geeks and avid bloggers, Robbie and Charlie, who question, what their favorite scary movie is, in honor of it being the anniversary of the events from the first film.

At home, Gale Weathers-Riley attempts to begin writing again after seeing Sidney on television, promoting her autobiography/self help book. She comes up with nothing. Across town, Sidney and her publicist, Rebecca Walters, arrive at a book store for the final stop on Sidney's tour. However, Sidney's pep-talk ends and she sees Gale has arrived. After a very little small talk, Dewey and Hicks storm in claiming that the cell phone used to call the two murdered girls is somewhere in the area.

Outside a cell rings and Rebecca tosses Dewey the keys to Sidney's rental car. He opens the trunk to reveal a bloody knife/dagger, the cell phone, and pictures of Sidney, smeared with the girls' blood. There are also a couple of copies of Sidney's new book. At the station, Gale has a fight with Hicks, claiming her pastries "taste like ass" followed by a disagreement with Dewey, who refuses her offer to help solve the case. Jill, Olivia, and Kirby are interviewed about the phone calls and Sidney is told she can't leave Woodsboro since she is technically a suspect. Sidney elects to stay with Jillian and Jillian's mother, Kate.

That night Jillian gets a visit from her ex, Trevor, who is scared away by Sidney. Later, while Kirby and Jill are watching Shaun of the Dead, Jillian talks to Olivia, who is changing next door, while Kirby deals with a call from Ghostface, who seems to be calling from Trevor's phone. Ghostface gets serious and claims, that he's in the closet. Kirby checks, but finds no Ghostface. Upon calling him a liar, he counters with, "I never said I was in your closet!" As Kirby realizes his meaning, he breaks out of Olivia's closet, proceeding to stab her and knock her around her room with Jillian, Kirby, and Sidney watching.

Rushing over, Sidney breaks in and gets upstairs in time to find Olivia's corpse, laid out on the bed with her intestines in a pile beside her. Ghostface calls her this time and Jill arrives, remembering Olivia's tendency to dub Sidney as "The Angel of Death". Ghostface pops out again, this time slashing Jill's arm, before being tackled and thrown down the stairs by Sidney. In the ensuing fight, Sidney seemingly knocks Ghostface unconscious but he disappears when she turns to see Detective Hoss and Deputy Perkins arrive, along with Kirby and Trevor.

Outside Olivia's house as the police investigate the crime scene, Jillian apologizes to Sidney after many neighbors shout things at Sidney about her being just like her mother and that this was her fault. Later at the hospital, Sidney fires Rebecca after she tries to take advantage of the current murders to sell Sidney's book and, obviously, her career. Heading to her car, Rebecca is attacked and thrown off the parking garage's roof onto a news van during Dewey's press conference regarding the murders. Meanwhile, Gale makes a deal with Robbie and Charlie: if they let her get an insight into the killings, since they know the conventions of modern horror, they get her and Sidney to appear at their school's Cinema Club as special guests.

At the cinema club the following afternoon, Charlie goes through the horror-genre and how the rules have changed since the 1990's. During this conversation, Robbie talks about the Stab-a-thon, an annual party, where the local teens get together and watch the Stab films while playing a drinking game. Gale tries to get the location but cannot convince the boys to tell her. Charlie and Robbie also say that the murders are related to the original film of Stab, as two kids died in their house (Steve and Casey = Marnie and Jenny) then the hottest girl in school is killed (Tatum = Olivia).

Jillian remains at home since her mom won't let her go, while Kirby heads to the party. Gale is revealed to have followed the teenagers to the abandoned barn, where the party is happening and proceeds to place cameras, her identity hidden by a Ghostface mask. Once she slips out to watch, Gale sees that someone is tampering with her cameras. She calls Dewey, convinced it's the killer, and threatens to go back inside, if he doesn't get there quick. Gale investigates her cameras and finds a webcam, planted to watch her. Outside, Dewey watches through a camera, one of Gale's that she is holding backward as the killer approaches, and rushes inside to save her. Gale is chased around the bales of hay, but her cries for help aren't heard over the opening scene of the original Stab. Gale is pinned down and Dewey spots her. He yells at the killer to freeze while aiming his gun and three things happen at once: the killer stabs Gale in the shoulder, Gale pushes him away with her foot, and Dewey shoots.

Dewey misses, the killer runs off, and Gale falls into the crowd of shocked teens, blood streaming from her right shoulder. She quickly warns Dewey about the webcam on the upper level before apparently losing consciousness.

At Jill's house, Detective Hoss goes on his rounds after Perkins said the fatal words, "I'll be right back." On his rounds, Hoss sees, that Jillian's bedroom window is open and returns to the car, finding Perkins slumped over the steering wheel. This turns out to be a cruel prank but neither laugh when Hoss is brutally attacked from behind and Perkins is stabbed in the forehead, citing "Fuck Bruce Willis!" before dying.

Inside, Sidney takes down the wind chimes, because they're off balance and she isn't sure how to fix them. A few moments later, she tenses, when she hears them again. Surprising her, it's revealed, that it's her aunt Kate, who comes in clutching grocery bags and leaves again to grab another one. Ghostface calls Sidney and makes a comment about her family being most important to her. This prompts Sidney to go check on Jill, but she finds the room empty with Jillian's laptop on the bed. Sidney opens it up and sees the messenger is left open, revealing that Kirby took Jill to her house for an after-party. Downstairs, Kate reveals that the cops are no longer out front and Sidney grabs her hand, intending to lead the way to the car. When they open the back door, they see Ghostface's reflection on the wind chimes and turn around. At the front door, Ghostface wrestles to get inside but Kate successfully closes the door by sitting down and propping herself between the door and the nearby archway. Unfortunately, Ghostface stabs her through the mail slot killing her.

Hicks arrives and checks on Kate but Sidney runs off. At Kirby's house, Trevor arrives, causing an upset among the others around: Kirby, Jillian, Robbie, and Charlie. He claims he was invited through a text from Jillian's phone. Jillian denies this and finds her phone has gone missing. She leaves for to go upstairs in an attempt to find it and Trevor follows her. Robbie heads outside, leaving Charlie and Kirby alone. They nearly have a moment but are interrupted by Trevor. Charlie leaves, clearly frustrated because his kiss with Kirby was interrupted. Trevor, partially embarrassed by what he walked in on, leaves as well.

Jillian comes back downstairs, claiming Trevor didn't follow her upstairs. A drunk Robbie tries to stream his live video blog but is surprised by Ghostface, who mercilessly stabs him and leaves him to die in the bushes. Sidney arrives with news of Kate's death and Robbie struggles to the door, gasping "run" before finally dying. Jillian and Sidney run upstairs (pursued by Ghostface) while Kirby runs off somewhere downstairs.

Sidney locks her and Jillian in Kirby's room, ordering Jillian to hide under the bed while she fakes Jillian's escape out on the terrace. Ghostface seemingly buys it and Sidney calls Dewey. She is forced to let go of the terrace to escape Ghostface. Downstairs, Sidney finds Kirby and they lock themselves in a room in the basement. Charlie arrives, hands soaked in blood and begs to be let inside. Sidney warns Kirby not to open the door unless she is 100% sure she can trust Charlie. Since Kirby doesn't trust him enough, all she and Sidney can do is watch as he is attacked by Ghostface before the patio lights go out.

When they reactivate, Charlie is duct-taped to a chair and Kirby is forced to become the new Casey Becker to his Steven Orth in order to save his life while Sidney sneaks back upstairs to find Jillian. Kirby answers her first question wrong but Ghostface gives her a pity "last chance" question. Without hearing the whole question, she answers by listing every possibility there is. When Ghostface doesn't respond after she's finished, she assumes she answered correctly. Rushing outside, Kirby sees a shadow slip away and frees Charlie while claiming she won. She is surprised when Charlie stabs her in the stomach and reveals himself as one the killers. He claims that "four years of classes together" is too long for Kirby to wait before trying to make a move on him. Charlie runs inside, leaving a bleeding Kirby for dead. Sidney, seeing Jillian is gone, goes to get Kirby but is caught by Charlie, who holds Sidney at knife-point. She struggles free but runs straight into Ghostface's blade as she races for the front door. Jillian reveals herself as the second killer and the mastermind behind the murders. Jillian claims that she never had a true identity. She was simply the girl related to Sidney Prescott and grew up in the shadow of a woman she had never even met. Charlie and Jill voice their intentions to become this generation's Sidney Prescott and Randy "Randall" Meeks.

Charlie reveals Trevor, who was gagged and bound in a nearby cupboard and Jillian says he's the one who'll take the fall for the massacre. This is meant to include the attacks on Jillian and Charlie, the only survivors. Jillian shoots Trevor in the groin as punishment for cheating on her after taking her virginity then shoots him in the head. When Charlie asks her to stab him in the shoulder, copying Billy and Stu's botched attempt to fake injuries in the first movie, she instead stabs him in the heart. Charlie is surprised by this and Jillian informs him that being the sole survivor would win her far more fans. Sidney asks, how she could have done this to all of her friends and Jill declares that she needs "fans... not friends!" He became the "Stu Macher" of the remake. Jillian continues her jealous rant to Sidney before stabbing her once more for good measure.

Jillian goes on to clean off the gun and leave it by Trevor's corpse. She uses his hand to scratch her cheek and pull out a handful of her hair. Jillian stabs herself with the knife by running against the wall pressing the knife into her shoulder. Then she cleans the knif/dagger, runs into a glass frame, and purposely falls onto a glass coffee table to cause herself more believable injuries, then collapses near Sidney. She mirrors her "death pose" exactly.

At the hospital, Jillian is hailed as a hero and she jokingly says that she and Gale could write a book together due to their matching shoulder wounds. Dewey tells Jillian that she might not be the sole survivor: Sidney is in the I.C.U. but hasn't woken up from surgery yet. After Dewey leaves, Jillian sneaks out of her room and goes there determined to kill Sidney.

Jillian proceeds to attack Sidney as she awakens, choking her and throwing her against the glass door of a nearby medicine cabinet. Dewey and Gale quickly realize the truth when they remember that Dewey never told Jillian about Gale's attack, or about her wounds. Dewey rushes off to find Sidney, calling Hicks for back-up.

Jillian hides herself in the supply closet, when she hears Dewey arriving and attacks him with a bedpan when he bursts in, only to be interrupted by Sidney. Jillian regains the upper hand and pushes her knee into Sidney's stitches, causing them to become undone. Gale intervenes but is nearly shot by Jillian, who has stolen Dewey's gun//pistol. Hicks jumps into the room, throwing herself and Gale over the nearby bed.

Jillian orders them to come out, on threat of shooting Dewey. Hicks jumps up immediately and is apparently shot dead. Gale gets up, too, and sees Sidney moving. Stalling for time, Gale fumbles over words in a poor attempt to stop Jillian as Sidney silently reaches for the shock paddles. Begging for one last word, Gale says, "Clear." Jillian questions this, then is electrocuted by Sidney, who puts one paddle to each temple. Sidney told her, she forgot the first rule of remakes: "Don't fuck with the original."

Gale and Sidney see that Dewey's alive. Behind them, a shadow moves and Jillian jumps up, pouncing at Sidney with a glass shard, only to be shot in the chest by a knowing Sidney. It turns out, that Judy has also survived because of the bulletproof vest she wore.

Sidney, in all the action, her injuries, and exhaustion, lies back down next to her cousin's body and whispers, "I don't know about you, but I feel a lot better."

Outside, lots of reporters are praising Jillian for having single handed ended the Woodsboro killings and the final shot is of Jillian's dead eyes, as the whole town is about to realize, that their supposed "savior" is actually the mastermind behind it all.

Reception
Scream 4 was the least successful movie of the Scream franchise. It received mixed reviews from critics, but was considered a huge improvement over Scream 3. There is a discussion about another sequel, but nothing concrete has yet been developed.

Trivia

 * As seen in the gag reel, there was an ongoing prank on set where somebody dressed in the Ghostface mask would jump out and scare an actor at a time when Ghostface wasn't scripted to appear. For example, an actor would open a door expecting nobody to be behind it, and instead somebody in the mask would jump out. On at least one instance, this prank was pulled on an actress during a scene where she was scripted to be chased by a killer, rounded a corner and met an unscripted appearance by Ghostface.
 * Wes Craven stated he was not going to return as director unless the script was as good as the first Scream.
 * For the first time in the series, a CGI-added knife was used because Wes Craven wanted to avoid using prop knives that are rubber, cardboard and collapsible.
 * Scream 4 opened in US theaters 15 April 2011, 15 years to the date after the original began filming.
 * Each of the new central characters is an archetype for one of the characters from the original: Jill (Sidney), Kirby and Olivia (Tatum), Trevor (Billy), Charlie (Stu), and Robbie (Randy).
 * The outfit that Trevor wears in the final act of the movie is the same outfit that Neil Prescott is wearing in the final act of the original. Trevor is also bound and gagged identically to Neil Prescott.
 * This is the first film in the series since the original in which the killer is among one of the characters pictured on the poster.
 * There was a planned sequel titled Scream 5 or stylized as "5cream" to be in development depending on the success of this film. There was concepts to have two more stories continue on from the fourth film, but was cancelled due to the Weinstein debacle a couple years later. When talk resurfaced to continue the plan of making Scream 5, talks about Scream 6 or "S6ream" followed, but both were scrapped due to the death of Wes Craven in 2015, who consulted and helped create the MTV series Scream shortly before he died.
 * This is the only film in the series where Sidney doesn't exclaim "F*ck you!" to at least one of the killers.