Dir. David Zucker
Writ. Craig Mazin, Jim Abrahams
Act. Anna Faris, Craig Bierko, Leslie Nielson

Just when you thought is was no longer possible to see a good spoof comedy, a Zucker brother comes to the rescue. David Zucker directs the fourth installment of the satire on the American horror genre that is enjoyable but not spectacular.

Cindy Campbell played by Anna Faris (Just Friends) moves into a house that is haunted by the ghost of a child. She must take on the quest to find out how he died and try and help the spirit all the while trying to survive the alien invasion that is trying to wipe out all life on the planet.

Obviously the fourth installment of Scary Movie spoofs The Grudge, War of the Worlds, as well as Saw, The Village, Million Dollar Baby, and Brokeback Mountain. Writers Craig Mazin and Jim Abrahams did a marvelous job of creating a satire that never goes overboard in its zany humor and is 95% tasteful. Speaking of tasteful, they did just that in spoofing President Bush on the day he heard of the 9/11 attacks. Actor Leslie Nielsen (The Naked Gun) who portrays President Harris does a good job being funny without being insulting. It could have been very easy to take this incident to far or make it insulting to all of this over spoofing 9/11, yet their talent and taste keeps them level headed and helps make a great scene.

I have mentioned in this review some icons, to me anyway, of satire or spoof comedies, David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Leslie Nielson. To me, and with apologies to Mel Brooks, these men along with Jerry Zucker and Pat Proft are the best at this comedy. They are responsible for the Naked Gun franchise, the first Airplane, Hot Shots 1 and 2, and have fully saved the Scary Movie franchise from the Wayans Brothers. If anybody wants to make these kind of comedies, producers in Hollywood should make it mandatory for the directors and writers to watch the above movies. I am specifically talking to the guys who did Date Movie, any Adam Sandler movie produced in the last two years, and the National Lampoon idiots. There is a right way and wrong way to do satire and the Zucker's and Abrahams know what they are doing.

Now that I have blown sunshine up their butts, I will say that the movie started to drag a little bit, once the story got out of the Grudge satire and moved to the Village satire. It was probably the weakest part of the story but it wasn't bad. However the 5% of the bad taste of the film happened in this part when the hot blind chick of the village walks into the church thinking it's the bathroom of her house and lets loose in the church stall. I have repeated many times that bodily functions are not funny so I will leave it at that.

Anna Faris continues to impress and I am quite sure that she has developed into a good comedic actress and should be able to take the next step in her ever promising career. Leslie Nielson did his standard performance and is the ultimate risk taker allowing himself to be filmed nude at the age of 80. Craig Bierko (Cinderella Man) does a fine job of spoofing Tom Cruise in general and in the War of the Worlds movie. The final scene of him acting like an ass on Oprah's couch was perfect and for a brief moment I thought I was watching that jackass on TV.

In this spring of hell when it comes to movies, Scary Movie 4 is an oasis in the desert of crap. It does have a few faults and it does slow a bit but is better than most of the garbage out their and should last long enough until the May blockbuster's arrive.

Brian - the Naked Gun