Shriek if You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th (2000) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)
This is another version of Scary Movie, actually made before the Wayans' film, and treads on exactly the same territory, making fun of the Scream series.

Here are some facts to help you determine if you'll like it:
The cast includes Rosemarie (from the old Dick Van Dyke Show), Tom Arnold, J.J. ("Dynomite") Walker, Coolio, Simon Rex, Shirley Jones (Partridge mom), and Tiffani-Amber Thiessen before she dropped the Amber.

NUDITY REPORT
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The humor includes having the high school office ask the following people to report to the principal's office: Ben Dover, Hugh G. Rektion, Heywood Jablomee, Mike Hunt, and others.

The character names include Coach Hasselhoff (the swim team, of course), The Administrator formerly known as Prince-ipal, Nurse Kevorkian, and Mrs Tingle.

The cell phone jokes include: (woman's voice) "I have a collect call for anyone from .... " (digitally altered voice) "... The Killer ..." (woman's voice) "...will you accept the charges?"

The "notes" all come on stationary that says, "from the desk of ... The Killer ... ", with a cute little picture of him in full masked regalia. Actually, one of them comes in a prize notification envelope, except it has the killer's picture instead of Ed McMahon. "You may already be a victim!" (I did laugh at that one)

The Mentos parody "death goes better ... with Mentos fresh and full of life"

One thing I appreciate in a comedy is that a good comedy writer knows that people can't agree on what's funny, so he can't make the entire film rely on one style of humor and five jokes. This film throws hundreds and hundreds of jokes at you, and when you see the kids walking along talking, there are more sight gags going on behind them - hell, I probably missed most of them because they went by so fast.

So that's the good news - if one gag doesn't make you laugh, there are five more in the next minute, and maybe one will tickle your funny-bone. It is just another version of Scary Movie, but that ain't all bad. Although director John Blanchard hasn't done much lately, he used to direct both SCTV and Kids in the Hall, so he knows how to deliver and pace the gags. (He directed the legendary "The Last Polka", about the Smenge Brothers)

DVD info from Amazon.

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The bad news:

(1) Tom Arnold is probably the funniest person in the movie

(2)the humor is sophomoric on the top end, and just grade school playground jokes on the bottom end. On the other hand, if you prefer more sophisticated humor, I'm sure there will be no waiting list at Blockbuster to check out "The Importance of Being Earnest".

The Critics Vote

The People Vote ...

  • With their votes ... IMDB summary: IMDb voters score it 5.1.
  • With their dollars ... made for USA network
IMDb guideline: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence, about like three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, about like two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, about like two stars from the critics. Films under five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film, equivalent to about one and a half stars from the critics or less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

My own guideline: A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. C means it will only appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover appeal. D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre. F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Based on this description, this film is a C-. An OK parody. A lot of gags don't work, but the pacing is very fast so there are hundreds of gags, and a lot of them do work

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