• Photo Courtesy Of Dimension Films And Woods Entertainment
• BLOODY GOOD! (Left to right) Journalist Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox) and high schoolers Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy) and Sidney (Neve Campbell) try to survive a serial killer, in horror auteur Wes Craven's brilliant reinvention of the slasher genre, Scream, screening Oct. 22 and 23 at the Palm Theatre in SLO.

What's it rated? R

When? Oct. 22 and 23, at 9:15 p.m.

Where's it showing? The Palm Theatre in SLO

Horror master Wes Craven (The Last House on the Left, The Hills Have Eyes, A Nightmare on Elm Street) directs this slasher film that both winked at and revitalized the genre upon its 1996 release. Tearing a page from Hitchcock's Psycho, the film kills off early its ostensible star (Drew Barrymore) before settling into the actual central character, high schooler Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell), who's also being stalked by a ghost-face-masked killer.

The film becomes a whodunit as Sidney works to figure out who's after her. Could it be her very own boyfriend, Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich); her father, Neil Prescott (Lawrence Hecht); her best friend Tatum Riley's (Rose McGowan) boyfriend, Stu Macher (Matthew Lilliard); or their friend Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy)? It all comes to a head at a party Stu throws after their high school is closed as the killer runs wild.

The film is a hoot from beginning to end. In addition to spoofing the slasher genre, the film gets its digs into the media in the form of sensationalist TV journalist Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox), who descends on the town to cover the murders. If you've never seen it, it's essential viewing. If you have, it bears repeated viewings to catch all the slasher tropes. (111 min.) Δ