Why the movie SCREAM worked

Horror movies and teenagers go together like chocolate and milk.

There are several contributing factors to why this is a match made in hell ... but the bottom line is this: Teenagers have the most expendable income. There's really no sense it bitching about either. You where once a teenager who watched movies marketed to your teenage self.

Don't hate.

Unfortunately, starting with my generation, censorship and paranoia among parents got really out of hand. (Thanks Tipper!) People started protesting the very thing they grew up watching and this has made it harder for anyone under 17 to see an "R" rated film.

So studios feel they are more less forced into releasing PG-13 bullshit. I know the rating makes the adults roll there eyes and NOT want to go see the movie but let's face it ...we are not the ones with a $100 + a week allowance. When your casting that hot new WB actor and your soundtrack is filled with top 20 rock hits ... your gonna make damn sure that your target audience (that has the most money to blow) is able to see the film.

It's just good business sense right?

How quick studios are to forget past formulas that worked ...

13 years ago, Wes Craven (master of the teenage horror film) put out a little movie called SCREAM. Now this is smack dab in the middle of the 90's A.K.A. the Tipper "fuck face" decade. Mainstream horror films had been teetering at the box office. Most people seemed more interested in Richard Gere and his awkward "romantic" stories.

Craven was not snowed by any of this and busted out a RATED R horror film geared towards teenagers. -Or perhaps a better phrasing would be ... the inner teenager. Just a closer look at SCREAM reveals Craven's well crafted plan to attract his original teenage audience. (Which by the time SCREAM was shot, was well into adulthood.) Sure the movies takes place in high school but the cast was made up of actors way past their teenage years. The movie had the rock n roll soundtrack but it featured artists like Nick Cave. In fact the whole movie reeked of 92' despite it coming out in 96'.

There in lies the key ... to make a truly successful horror movie, you must appeal to the inner teenage self of the generation that just got DONE with being teenagers. You have to make adults spend their money like teenagers. Get them excited about something and then make it GOOD. Trust me the current teenager will find a way to get into the "R" horror film. If there's enough hype, they will come ... in masses. In an 13-16 year olds eyes the R rating is even better because it's forbidden.

There goes that PG-13 theory.

Sucka.

<3

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