Halloween Countdown – 31 Scary Moments – Oct. 29

October officials marks the beginning of Scary Season. With this in mind, the Pepper Bough is celebrating with a daily dose of creepy moments sure to make your hairs stand on end. Come celebrate with us… if you dare.

In honor of Homecoming, let’s talk about “Scream” (1996).

After the 1980s introduced a popular canon of marketable monsters, like Jason Vorhees, Michael Myers, Freddie Krueger, and Chucky, the 1990s began a dry spell for the horror genre. Sure, there were notable standouts like “Candyman” (1992), but mainly Hollywood had turned its attention to prestige costume drama horrors after the success of Francis Ford Coppola’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” (1992).

That left a wide gap to be filled in the mainstream horror world with the type of scary stories audiences wanted to line up to see.

Enter Kevin Williamson, a brash young screenwriter with a clever idea and a true 1990s ironic point-of-view. He wrote the script for “Scream,” which at that point was called “Scary Movie,” and managed to get Hollywood executives lining up to make his movie. “Scream” was finally made by Dimension Films, which was, scary enough, owned and operated by Hollywood pariahs the Weinstein brothers.

They brought in horror movie legend Wes Craven to direct.

And the world found its next massive franchise.

Few moments in any horror film work every time, but the opening scene of “Scream” absolutely does. It is a take on the shower scene from Hitchcock’s “Psycho” (1960) as it introduces us to a well-known actress—Drew Barrymore—who we have no doubts should be our main character until she meets a premature end, throwing us into the chaos of a film without an anchor.

Barrymore plays Casey Becker, waiting for her boyfriend to arrive at her home so they can enjoy a night of popcorn, scary movies, and teenage hormones. Everything is perfect until the phone rings, and a mysterious voice asks her the film’s tagline: “What’s your favorite scary movie.”

This begins a cat-and-mouse game between Casey and killer, as she discovers he is there with her, watching her every move as he uses horror movie trivia to distract and torment her. This leads to an exchange so absurd, yet never fails to deliver the chills.

Phone Voice: Name the killer in Friday the 13th.

Casey: Jason! Jason! Jason!

Phone Voice: I’m sorry. That’s the wrong answer!

Casey: No, it’s not. No it’s not. It was Jason.

Phone Voice: Afraid not. No way.

Casey: Listen, it was Jason! I saw that movie 20 goddamn times!

Phone Voice: Then you should know that Jason’s mother, Mrs. Voorhees was the original killer. Jason didn’t show up until the sequel. I’m afraid that was a wrong answer.

Casey: [Weeping] You tricked me.

Phone Voice: Lucky for you there’s a bonus round, but poor Steve… I’m afraid he’s OUT!