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Scary Movie 4
The Weinstein Company

Scary Movie 4 reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 40 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
6.2 out of 10
based on 23 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 75 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: PG-13 for crude and sexual humor throughout, some comic violence and language

Starring Anna Faris, Regina Hall, Craig Bierko, Simon Rex, Kimani Ray Smith, Carmen Electra, Shaquille O'Neal, and Dr. Phillip C. McGraw

What do you get when you mix fearless comedic genius with the latest box-office blockbusters? You guessed it. The Scary Movie gang is back with the most hilarious and irreverent installment yet. (The Weinstein Company)


GENRE(S): Comedy  |  Horror  
WRITTEN BY: Craig Mazin (also story)
Jim Abrahams
 
DIRECTED BY: David Zucker  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: August 15, 2006 
Theatrical: April 14, 2006 
RUNNING TIME: 83 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

75
San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub
About five times as funny as "Scary Movie 3."
Read Full Review
70
LA Weekly Tim Grierson
The sort of movie you like in spite of yourself, Scary Movie 4 is obvious and dumb, but it possesses such a giddy, good-hearted spirit that even its terrible jokes (and there are tons) get by on something resembling charm.
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67
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
This a rapid-fire romp through "War of the Worlds," "Saw," "The Grudge" and "The Village," cut up into skits and pieced back together in some mutant jigsaw puzzle with a few pieces missing, delivers a barrage of low-minded gags with high-spirited energy.
Read Full Review
67
Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
Anna Faris, her deadpan comic timing still a joy to watch, returns as Cindy Campbell, one of two main holdovers from the first three movies.
Read Full Review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Jennie Punter
Writing, casting and pacing are vital. Scary Movie 4 doesn't let any gag get stale. It's rapid-fire, hit-and-miss and hit-and-strike comedy.
Read Full Review
63
New York Daily News Jami Bernard
There are plenty of chuckles at the expense of Dr. Phil, Shaquille O'Neal, Carmen Electra, Charlie Sheen and series stalwart Leslie Nielsen. But with no comic carryover from one skit to the next, true belly laughs are few and far between.
Read Full Review
58
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
And as ever, the jokes are a jumble of the gross, the baggy, the raunchy, the mistimed, and - every once in a while - the refreshingly incorrect.
Read Full Review
50
The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
The humor emphasizes quantity over quality, but the batting average isn't too bad. And where else can you witness Leslie Nielsen do a nude scene?
Read Full Review
50
The New York Times Nathan Lee
The fun of Scary Movie 4 is that it isn't a movie at all. Organized on the principle of parody, not plot, driven by gags and cultural feedback, it's an exercise in lowbrow postmodernism, a movie-movie contraption more nuts than Charlie Kaufman's gnarliest fever dream. It's cleverly stupid.
Read Full Review
50
TV Guide Angel Cohn
But for those jonesing for a loosely connected string of comedy sketches, heavy on the scatological humor, this is the fix.
Read Full Review
50
ReelViews James Berardinelli
To go with the good, there's plenty of bad, and it comes in the form of countless gags that misfire, far too much flatulence and urine, and (God help us) a buck naked Leslie Nielsen. Admittedly, that scene certainly puts the "scary" in Scary Movie 4.
Read Full Review
50
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
Shaquille O'Neal and Dr. Phil open Scary Movie 4 with an achingly unfunny couple of minutes of severed limbs and errant hoop shots.
Read Full Review
50
Village Voice Luke Y. Thompson
The jokes miss more than they hit, but there are a lot of them, and when they work, it's gold.
Read Full Review
50
The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
The best parts come in the rare moments when the film decides to break from formula, as when old Zucker-team warhorse Leslie Nielsen returns as the U.S. President.
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40
Film Threat Clint Morris
The series has turned into the cinematic equivalent of a flat bicycle tyre – it starts off with lots of air in it, but can quickly go flat when punctured.
Read Full Review
40
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
The fourth installment in the horror-parody franchise combines plot elements from "The Grudge," "The Village," and "War of the Worlds," with abbreviated spoofs of "Saw," "Brokeback Mountain," and "Million Dollar Baby." The amount of screen time allotted to each movie is roughly proportional to its box office take, suggesting that the first draft of the screenplay was written on a calculator.
Read Full Review
40
Variety Dennis Harvey
Scary Movie 4 finds horror parody overshadowed by ho-hum groin blows, C-list celebrity cameos, slapstick child abuse, soon-to-be-forgotten hip-hop personalities, plus scatalogical and gay jokes; real laughs are few.
Read Full Review
30
Los Angeles Times Jan Stuart
Isn't it amazing to see just how low some people will stoop if you pay them enough?
Read Full Review
30
Slate Ben Wasserstein
Jokes from Scary Movie 3 are recycled ad nauseam.
Read Full Review
25
Boston Globe Wesley Morris
Part sketch-comedy cartoon, part Cracked magazine spoof, installment four is the most scornfully made yet.
Read Full Review
25
New York Post Lou Lumenick
Scary Movie 4 concludes by satirizing Cruise's couch-jumping orgy on "Oprah." Funny, but nowhere near as hilarious as the real thing.
Read Full Review
20
Empire Kim Newman
Worse than Scary Movies 1 through 3… And they were terrible.
Read Full Review
0
Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
So lazy it's downright boring, something not even a naked Leslie Nielson (!) can salvage.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 6.2 (out of 10) based on 75 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Adam E gave it a1:
So bad it's good, then bad, then good, then finally bad. A bunch of immature jokes that revert to repetitive toilet/sex jokes rather than actual spoof.

Reece S. gave it a3:
Funny if you're a 2 year old.

Peter J. gave it a5:
Eh, I've seen worse. Did anyone actually expect any better than a 5? Seriously. I got what I expected. I few predictable lewd laughs. Nothing more.

Suraj N gave it a10:
It was a great movie that had me in stitches.

John D gave it a10:
With Scary Movie 4, director David Zucker and screenwriters Jim Abrahams and Craig Mazin (let's call the trio: "ZAM") do more than just spoof recent scary movies. ZAM's gags, puns, and parodies bring out the philosophical confusions at the heart of contemporary responses to politics and art. In other words, ZAM's "bad taste" exposes the hegemony of "good taste."

Jonah M. gave it a6:
If this is the first Scary Movie you ever see, you'll find it hilarious. Otherwise, the recycled feel of all the jokes will totally get to you. It just feels so much like Scary Movie 1, 2, and 3.

Elie N. gave it a9:
One of the most funny movie EVER (after scary movie 3) !!! If you relax and stop worrying about the plot you'll find it hailarious because of it's stupidity!

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