Horror Movie Review: Scream Park (2012)

Scream Park is the directorial debut of Cary Hill and was partially funded through a Kickstarter campaign. Hill was inspired to create Scream Park after visiting a theme park and thinking that it would be a good location for an 80’s themed horror film.

Scream Park certainly lives up to that idea & thanks to a good cast, turns out to be an enjoyable horror flick.

The theme park, Fright Land is due to close thanks to a decline in sales. People just aren’t interested in cheesy jump scares & crappy rides anymore. Most of the staff are sad to see it go so organise a final employee only party in the park after closing.

Jennifer (Wendy Wygant) is our ‘final girl’ introduced early as the person not to sure about an after hours party & the first to notice that things are a bit ‘off’ once the night begins.

She’s not wrong though as the employees come under attack from two masked men intent on killing all of them. Cue much running, screaming & blood flying.

Why are they under attack though? That is revealed in the final third of the movie & won’t be spoiled here save for the fact that is explained in a flashback scene involving Pinhead himself (Doug Bradley) in a cameo.

Scream Park is a heavy box-ticking exercise that is a love-letter to the 80’s slasher genre. It uses familiar tropes & set-ups but doesn’t fall into a lot of the pitfalls either. The setting is fun & even though it’s a low budget horror offering it makes good use of what it has available.

As mentioned above the acting is solid especially with characters that are designed to be walking clichés. It is a bit disappointing to see that the box art & much of the promotion suggest that Doug Bradley has a starring role when he is in it for barely 2 minutes. That’s cheeky & unnecessary.

There are few surprises here & the movie trots along at a reasonably comfortable pace. It never bores but it never really lights a fire under you either. Credit has to be given for what was achieved though. Especially considering how many other horrors with far bigger budgets are far less entertaining.

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