`Scream 3′ keeps irony of film forerunners

In theaters SCREAM 3

In Wes Craven’s “Scream 3,” it’s deja vu all over again, all over again. Indeed, what’s true about this film is true about the final installment of most trilogies — its pace is sometimes bogged down by convoluted references to the previous two films.

Those who haven’t seen 1996’s “Scream” and 1997’s “Scream 2” might be a bit lost in “Scream 3,” but aficionados of the series will appreciate how the film retains the essence of what makes the series work — a satisfying sense of irony underscored with horror violence, camp wedded to nauseating sentimentality, a clever sense of humor sharpened with wit.

This time out, the formula has worn thin, but Craven nevertheless finds his footing in the muck, charging forward with such verve, the audience happily tags along in spite of the film’s anorexic characterizations and exhausted plot contrivances.

Once again, the story revolves around Neve Campbell’s Sidney Prescott, a misunderstood mess of wincing nerves who has used her experience in “Scream”and “Scream 2” to become a crisis intervention phone counselor for battered women. As noble as that profession is, Craven essentially overlooks it in favor of Sidney’s chief job, which is to tear up on cue while looking as if she’s forever on the verge of collapse.

And who can blame her? In four years, most of Sidney’s friends have been stabbed, hacked, butchered or bludgeoned to death by a host of psychotic killers in scary death masks.

“Scream 3” is no exception. The film — in keeping with the horror movie cliches it skewers — begins with a violent pair of murders before establishing that the action will not occur in Woodsboro, but in Hollywood, where production on “Stab 3,” a horror film based on the events in “Scream 2,” is under way.

When the film’s cast starts being killed in the same order they’re murdered in “Stab 3’s” screenplay, the police are hauled in, Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox Arquette) and Dewey Riley (David Arquette) start sleuthing, and Sidney herself appears with pepperbox in hand for the final showdown.

There are new characters here, but none quite as inviting as Parker Posey’s Jennifer Jolie, a goofy, slightly paranoid actress who has the difficult job of portraying Weathers in “Stab 3.” As she does in most of her films, Posey steals the show, particularly when she’s on screen opposite Courteney Cox Arquette, who, for reasons unclear, has transformed herself to look like a cross between Cher, Cousin It and Witchiepoo.

Now, that’s scary.

Grade: B-

On video CHILL FACTOR

Apparently, if Hollywood shows Cuba Gooding Jr. enough money, the actor will appear in just about anything — including 1998’s wretched “What Dreams May Come,” 1999’s insipid “Instinct,” and now “Chill Factor,” a film that actually features a chemical weapon whose nickname is “Elvis.”

The once-promising actor has become one of Hollywood’s least reliable performers. Where has Gooding gone wrong? Certainly not just in his choice of films. For four years, he has been playing exhausted variations of the role that won him an Academy Award in “Jerry Maguire.” It’s as if the actor can’t accept a role that doesn’t require him to be manic — which, for this critic, is becoming rather depressive.

“Chill Factor” is no exception. The film, which has more meat and potatoes than a Hungry Man frozen entree, is about a chemical weapon tucked within a canister (the aforementioned “Elvis”) that must be kept below 50 degrees — or else it will explode.

That’s the painfully thin premise, but who cares if the canister explodes or if it’s caught by a group of unintentionally hilarious commandos fighting to steal it so they can sell it on the open market? When you have two bumbling idiots like Arlo (Gooding) and his sidekick, Tim (Skeet Ulrich), trying to save the world, you have to question whether this particular world is worth saving at all.

Grade: D-

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News Film Critic. His reviews appear each Monday and Thursday in the NEWS, each Tuesday and Thursday on WLBZ’s “News Center 5:30 Today” and “News Center Tonight,” and each Saturday and Sunday on WCSH’s statewide “Morning Report.”