Writer-director Tatiana Bliss' SCREAM QUEEN (Indican Pictures, 2005) doesn't try to be an in-depth, definitive portrait of a horror actress and her trials and travails in both the movie business and fandom at large.
While touching fleetingly on such concerns, it's mainly just a lightweight comedy with all of that stuff serving as a backdrop for both farcical situations and awkward attempts at something more heartfelt.
Liz Lavoie plays Dana Lewis, the titular scream queen who's tired of shrieking her way through the usual gore/zombie/serial killer flicks and starts trying to break into the upper levels of the acting business where they hand out gold statuettes.
Bliss takes a few stabs here and there about how poor, put-upon horror actresses are taken advantage of by sleazy male producers and directors, how they're seen as sex objects who can't really act (not always an incorrect assessment), how drugs and alcohol seem to force their way down their throats, and various other boo-hoo stuff meant to give the story more heft.
But it's basically just a straightforward comedy in which she ends up in the desert making an ultra cheapo horror flick with some of her most obsessive fanboys turned filmmakers armed with a digital video camera and no budget.
Lavoie gets to play Dana in constant hyperactive freakout mode as she finds herself surrounded by weirdos (a guy whose significant other is a blow-up doll, a brain-fried trailer couple who cook meth in addition to feeding the crew, a standard "religious fanatic" and her emotionally stunted daughter, and various other overly-agitated characters), not to mention a novice director (Nipper Knapp as "Jason") with a growing, and unwelcome, romantic attachment to her.
The screenplay veers between abject silliness and small pockets of semi-seriousness, as Dana gradually warms up to her co-workers and discovers that winning bigtime acting awards may not be as important as simple human interaction on a warmly intimate level.
This, unfortunately, goes awry when she suddenly gets a chance to chuck her newfound friends (including a budding romance with Jason) in favor of a chance at real stardom.
Production values are bargain basement quality but the film never pretends otherwise. In fact, the slapdash nature of the whole thing adds to a certain breeziness that gets us through a few less-than-inspired passages in what is basically a pretty familiar story.
A bit amateurish and insubstantial, SCREAM QUEEN is, at its best, a pleasantly amusing timewaster that's interesting mainly because it's a no-budget exploitation movie about people making a no-budget exploitation movie.
TECH SPECS
Runtime: 86 minutes
Format: 1:85
Sound: Dolby SR
Language: English
Genre: Comedy, Horror, Cult
Rating: R
Country: USA
Bonus: Bloopers, Deleted Scenes, Auditions, Interviews, Trailers
WATCH THE TRAILER
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