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08th Mar 2023

Scream VI pays homage to the best kill scene in the series

Rory Cashin

best scream kill

The directors also reveal the one sequence they were most excited to film.

During our recent ranking of the Scream movies, we announced that Scream 2 was the best Scream movie, and that movie also features the best Scream kill to date. The scene in question involves Sidney (Neve Campbell) and Hallie (Elise Neal) forced to physically climb over the unconscious body of the Ghostface killer, after the cop car they were all in crashed.

It was a scene of pure giddy tension, with each new element adding more and more suspense to the set-piece until it pays off in a way that you can sort of see coming, but not fully predict. It is that constantly spiking level of suspense that makes it the best Scream kill (to date), and when we sat down with Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, the directors of Scream VI, we remarked that a particular sequence in their new horror sequel (it involves a ladder, and that is all we’ll say right now) felt like a direct homage to that Scream 2 scene.

“Especially on this one – a lot on the last one – and really, really on this one, we wanted to make sure that all of those set pieces had a real identity, because, you’re calling out that one, that is one of our favourites. That one, and then also Gale and Dewey also in Scream 2, those are the two most iconic ones to us, that are just incredible set-pieces that have so many gears that just keep ratcheting up the tension. And we really wanted to make sure that we were able to do that in this movie. We watched the others endlessly on a loop, so it is sort of in our DNA at this point.”

Additionally, JOE mentioned that there was one sequence that the directors had already ear-marked as being one they were VERY excited to shoot, and very excited for audiences to see. Tyler Gillett explained further:

“I think for us, one of the sequences on the page that we were just really thrilled to get on set and shoot was the bodega. There was something about it, and I think the ingredients about it are just so specific. It is a really pedestrian location and the identity totally changes when Ghostface walks in. And we love a good sneak, we love the tension of a movie that really has a lot of loud moments. And there is this one little set-piece that gets so quiet that you can’t help but lean into the screen. And that, for us, there was something about it that felt really familiar, and the alchemy of that scene, I think we were just really excited to watch it come to life.”

Scream VI arrives in cinemas on Thursday, 9 March, and you can check out our interviews with cast members Jasmin Savoy Brown and Mason Gooding here, and Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera here.

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