SCREAM 7

Ghostface on the loose!

SCREAM 7 (2026). Co-written and directed by Kevin Williamson. 

Sidney (Neve Campbell) has relocated to the new town of Pine Grove with her sheriff husband Mark (Joel McHale) and teenage daughter, Tatum (Isabel May). Then Sidney begins to get video calls from Stu Macher (Matthew Lillard), one of the killers in the original Scream. But hasn't Stu been dead for years? When the killings start again with a new Ghostface on the loose, Sidney and old pal Gail Weathers (Courteney Cox) team up to investigate if Stu is somehow still alive or if someone else is hiding behind AI-generated deep fakes. 

Victims: Tatum (right) and her pals

Scream 7 is a fast-paced, often thrilling, and quite suspenseful slasher flick with generally good performances. The best sequences are the prologue with a young couple running into trouble in a house that commemorates the murders back in Hillsboro, and a sequence in which a poor victim in a bar is sort of turned into a beer spigot. Usually the Scream movies are comparatively restrained and tasteful, but a gross and sadistic sequence in a theater features a graphic disembowelment that might be more at home in one of those Terrifier movies. The motive for the gruesome murders, as many others have noted, is so lame as to be laughable, but fortunately it doesn't ruin the movie. Although the Scream flicks were originally black comedies with as many jokes as screams, this installment -- aside from the dumb finale -- is basically played more or less straight. As usual the film glosses over the utter misery faced by the loved ones of the victims left in the wake of the maniac. Campbell and Cox also appeared in 2022's Scream. Mason Gooding, one of Gail Weathers' team, was also in the slasher flick Heart Eyes. 

Verdict: Still fun despite its flaws. ***. 

TEACHING MRS. TINGLE

Helen Mirren

TEACHING MRS. TINGLE (1999). Written and directed by Kevin Williamson.

When it appears that three high school students have been trying to steal test questions, their very nasty teacher Mrs. Tingle (Helen Mirren) promises that they are going to pay dearly. This is especially bad news for Leigh (Katie Holmes), who is hoping to go to Harvard. She and her friend, Trudie (Liz Stauber), go to Tingle's home to beg and plead, and the woman winds up getting hit by a crossbow! Instead of calling for an ambulance, the young ladies tie her to her bed and hope for the best. Mrs. Tingle revives, but how can Leigh and Trudy convince their teacher not to go to the police? 

Young cast members of Tingle up against Mirren

Frankly, I thought that Teaching Mrs. Tingle might wind up in one of my "Films I Never Quite Finished" posts more than once, but at least the picture is unpredictable, and while I can't say I particularly liked the movie, I did want to see how it would all turn out. Helen Mirren, if course, easily out-acts the rest of the cast, although they manage to acquit themselves in a more or less professional manner. Jeffrey Tambor is also good as Coach Wenchell, who winds up unwittingly helping Leigh in her goal. The irritating thing is that the only really guilty party (to the original offense) is a jerk named Luke (Barry Watson), who never once offers to take the blame and let the gals off the hook. Michael McKean is the principal; Lesley Ann Warren is Leigh's mother; Molly Ringwald is Miss Banks; and Viveca A. Fox scores as another teacher, Miss Gold. The characters are virtually all unsympathetic and the movie, written and helmed by the writer of the Scream movies, is morally bankrupt. 

Verdict: Well, at least it's somewhat different and a wonderful Mirren is always watchable. **1/4.