Movie Review: Scary Movie 4

By Cynthia Fuchs

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What Parents Should Know
Parents should know that the film includes assorted violent acts, exaggerated for comedy, such as stabbings, shootings, collisions, car crash, seppuku, a hit to the crotch, running into trees and a building, boxing, necks breaking, Mike Tyson lookalike biting off ears, vehicles and shipyard containers slamming into people, alien tripods zapping people into electricky dust, and U.S. military blowing things up. Tom hits his daughter with suitcase, slams her head in car door, and leaves her outside to be zapped by aliens. Saw spoof includes saw to cut off leg, knife to cut out eyeball, toothy torture helmets, and other mechanical threats. Very little blood visible throughout the film, exaggerated sound effects for breaking bones, some screams of comedic terror. At film's end, Tom ("the man who saved the world") appears on Oprah, where he eats the sofa, punches Oprah (she punches back), smashes her with a chair, breaks her hands, and generally destroys the set. Characters drink vodka and beer; characters refer to "weed." Characters make sexual references (language and some images, with immature joking about nakedness and genitalia). Lots of profanity. In the context of not liking kids, the president says, "Remind me to sign that abortion bill."

Parents can discuss the point of movie spoofs: Do you need to know the original films to get the jokes? Are these send-ups clever? Why is this movies series so popular?

Common Sense Media Review
Another movie comedy mash-up, SCARY MOVIE 4 suggests the franchise has run out of steam... again. And yet, it keeps coming. The first moments, drawn from Saw, feature the two least professional and most engaging performers: Dr. Phil and Shaq are chained in the basement and their escape depends on Shaq making free throws, which he cannot do, er, to save his life.

From here, the film turns to Cindy (dauntless Anna Faris), yet again enduring a series of physical abuses inspired by several film plots. She starts off in The Grudge, working as a home-caregiver for Mrs. Norris (Cloris Leachman)and a dark-eyed ghost-boy (Garrett Masuda). She and handsome neighbor Tom (Craig Bierko) meet cute when he hits her in the head with a baseball intended to slam into his rebellious son Robbie (Beau Mirchoff). They trade sad romantic histories (hers taken from Million Dollar Baby, where her husband/cornerman [Simon Rex] breaks his neck and dies; his involves his angry ex [Molly Shannon]).

When the alien tripods pop out of the ground (from War of the Worlds), everyone runs in different directions, so they can run into a few hip-hop artists scattered over the landscape (Chingy, Fabolous, and Lil' Jon). Tom can bonds with his screaming meemie daughter Rachel (Conchita Campbell), in more War of the Worlds scenes (they meet the crazy survivalist [Michael Madsen, who essentially just shows up, then disappears], Robbie is so excited by the U.S. military blowing stuff up that he runs off to join), and Cindy can reunite with Brenda (Regina Hall), her best friend from early Scary Movies.

The girls end up in The Village, where they're beaten up by a couple of girls whose old-timey dress they try to steal, and Brenda again displays her voracious sexual appetite. Here, Carmen Electra plays the blind girl (who runs into a tree, smacks her father [good sport Bill Pullman] in the crotch with her cane, strips to her corset and poops in the public meeting house, thinking it's her home), Chris Elliot plays the "idiot," who spurts out foul language (this is a feeble attempt at a joke).

The more interesting, if not exactly original, bits of humor are not about movies per se, but about popular images, namely, images of George W. Bush. President Harris (Leslie Nielsen) is introduced by way of a 9/11 joke: he's in a children's classroom listening to a story about a duck, and can't tear himself away when he hears of the attacks. When he finally does come away, he mutters that he dislikes children, and asks to be reminded to "sign that abortion bill," and when he makes a speech to the U.N., he demonstrates a ray that dissolves clothing and leaves everyone in the room naked -- all holding up folders and books to cover themselves. Ands yes, there's a joke here about emperors and new clothes.

Families who like this movie will like Scary Movie (rated R), Scream, the R-rated and actually funny Shaun of the Dead, or the granddaddy of spoof movies, Airplane!