SCARY MOVIE 2 - DVD review

(A) If you loved the first "Scary Movie" and found its jokes hilarious, you'll probably also like "Scary Movie 2," even though its gags are sillier and its plot more erratic. (B) If you barely tolerated "Scary Movie" and found most of its humor embarrassingly coarse and juvenile, you'll probably like "Scary Movie 2" less because its humor is even more embarrassingly lewd and infantile. (C) If you thoroughly disliked practically every aspect of "Scary Movie," you'll probably hate "Scary Movie 2" altogether, no questions asked. I vote for (C).

Take the opening gambit, for instance. Remember the rather shocking scene in "The Exorcist" when Linda Blair as the possessed girl, Regan, pees on her mother's white carpet during a dinner party? Now, if you were going to parody that scene, what would you do? Yes, you'd probably do exactly what "Scary Movie 2" does. You'd have a young girl pee exaggerated volumes on a white carpet until she's standing in a huge pool of her own yellow fluid. Do you see where I'm going with this? If you came up that bit off the top of your head in a split second, why were seven people (that's how many scriptwriters are listed in the credits) paid presumably good money to come up with something equally banal, equally insipid?

The whole movie is like this, one gag after another that make us want to gag. The jokes are either sexually smutty or grossly crude, with nothing in between, and, worse, few of the jokes are in the remotest way funny.

The movie begins its takeoffs with both "The Exorcist" and "The Legend of Hell House," the mansion in question being Kane Manor (looking suspiciously like the old place in the game and movie, "Clue") where the aforementioned possessed girl and her demented father lived before everyone died mysteriously. In the prologue we witness the normally sane James Woods as a priest trying to exorcise the house and getting into a puking contest with the demon girl. Now, years later, a horny professor of parapsychology named Oldman, played by Tim Curry, wants to reawaken the spirits of the house (in a spoof of "The Haunting," 1999 version) by bringing in a team of male and female college students who may have extrasensory powers but are being told they are engaged in an experiment in sleep disorders. Actually, Curry just wants to use his hidden video cameras to peek in on as many of the girls as possible undressing.

The people involved in the setup besides Curry are several of the same gang from the first movie. Director Keenen Ivory Wayans brings back his brothers Shawn and Marlin as Ray, the sexually disoriented hunk, and Shorty, the pea-brained pothead, plus Anna Farris as the sexually naive and seemingly still virginal Cindy, and Regina Hall as Ray's girlfriend, Brenda. In addition, we have Chris Masterson as Buddy, James DeBello as Tommy, Tori Spelling as Alex, Kathleen Robertson as Theo, and a foul-mouthed parrot with a peg leg. The peg leg is possibly the funniest (and cleanest) gag in the film. Finally, there's David Cross as Dwight Hartman, the professor's wheelchair-bound assistant, and Chris Elliott as Hanson, the weird caretaker with the deformed hand. These latter two characters are part of the make-fun-of-the-handicapped portion of the show, something that's apparently supposed to demonstrate how politically incorrect and, therefore, how hip the filmmakers can be.

I blush to admit that for the first twenty minutes I had some minimal interest in looking at the screen, but after that I failed to as much as smile. The nonstop flatulence jokes, defecation jokes, raw sexual jokes, and extreme profanity finally drove my mind away while my eyes and ears remained dutifully attentive. It doesn't help that the story line is sporadic and disconnected, as though pieced together on the spot by its team of writers and cast members. The resultant film attempts to parody, besides "The Exorcist" and "The Legend of Hell House," things like "Poltergeist," "Killer Klowns from Outer Space," "Little Shop of Horrors," "A Nightmare on Elm Street," "The Shining," "Dirty Harry," "Hannibal," "Charlie's Angels," "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," and "The Matrix." That "Scary Movie 2" doesn't warrant mention in the same breath as any of these other films goes without saying, but it does give you an idea what the filmmakers were up to, unsuccessfully.

Video:
Buena Vista's transfers always look different to me than those from other studios. The picture quality for "Scary Movie 2" seems to be bright and glossy, deep and dark and almost gaudy, with sometimes minor rough edges and murky backgrounds. None of this is severe, and, indeed, it makes for a visually arresting image, but it isn't entirely natural to the eyes, either. The widescreen ratio is a very ordinary 1.74:1, enhanced for 16x9 televisions.

Audio:
The Dolby Digital 5.1 audio is also unimpressive. Now, I'm not one who normally desires a lot of surround-sound action, and in many films I'd rather the rear channels were toned down. But in a movie like this one, the humor needs all the help it can get, if for no other reason than to distract one from the bad jokes. But the rear channels only come to life now and then, mainly with thunder and rain and very occasional musical ambiance. So don't depend on this film being an audiovisual demo disc; far from it.

Extras:
There is a sizable collection of bonus items on the disc, but none of them add up to very much. The first is an eight-minute behind-the-scenes featurette, with a lot of talk from the actors and crew. The most revealing remark comes from Marlon Wayans, who tells us, "You can't think about not offending people; you just gotta go with the jokes." That just about sums up the caliber of humor in the film. Next, there are a staggering twenty-two deleted and alternate scenes, including three different endings. About the only one worth watching, however, is one that parodies "What Lies Beneath." Another of the deleted scenes is too dirty for me even to describe it indirectly. What was going through these filmmakers' minds when they made up this stuff? After that there are several brief featurettes: "Special Effects Tour," five minutes long; "Scary Effects," two minutes; "Behind the Makeup," four minutes; and "Here, Kitty, Kitty," two minutes. Then, there's a stills gallery, various DVD-ROM features I didn't explore, and seven Sneak Peeks at other Buena Vista titles including "Scary Movie" but, curiously, none for "Scary Movie 2." During all of the menu time, we get to listen to the parrot mouthing off. Lastly, there are nineteen scene selections, English and French spoken languages, and Spanish subtitles.

Parting Shots:
"Scary Movie 2" has to qualify as one of the worst movies of 2001. I'd place it just a notch above "Freddy Got Fingered" because at least it didn't purposely try to insult its audience. "Scary Movie 2" is just gross and inept, certainly a much dumber movie than anything it tries to spoof. But it does have one redeeming attribute: brevity. It's only eighty-two minutes long. Thank heaven for very small favors.