Scary Movie 4: Critic Reviews

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.

Driven by gags and cultural feedback, Scary Movie 4 is an exercise in lowbrow postmodernism, a movie-movie contraption more nuts than Charlie Kaufman's gnarliest fever dream.

Scary Movie 4 never takes you close to death by laughter, as the Naked Gun films did. But it's funny enough to turn the hands on your watch much more quickly than you can believe.

The perpetual engine of the unkillable Scary Movie chain is toxic cynicism.

The jokes miss more than they hit, but there are a lot of them, and when they work, it's gold.

There's only so much humor left to wring from the pup tent of Brokeback Mountain or the matted-hair fetish of the Japanese horror genre.

Four installments later, the horror-movie jokes have gotten broader, grosser and just plain dumber.

Like the gags, many of the cameos don't pack a whole lot of punch, but enough succeed so that the viewer leaves with a mildly favorable impression. Regrettably, this is probably more a function of human psychology than moviemaking skill.

A throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-if-it-sticks onslaught of potty jokes, puns, celebrity cameos, J-horror, and j-high sophistication and wit. You get laughs, but not nearly as many as you'd hoped.

It has 10 big belly laughs, which puts it about a dozen ahead of this season's competition.

Frighteningly silly, intentionally incorrect and stupendously stupid, Scary Movie 4 skewers everything in its path with a wild-eyed glee that's contagious.

Scary Movie 4 proves that downward momentum is still momentum, and some comedic concepts keep rolling long after they've exhausted almost all the laughs.

The even numbers don't favor the Scary Movie franchise. Inspiration ran dry for the Wayans Brothers in No. 2; now successors David Zucker & Co suffer gag fatigue following up their moderately improving efforts on the third installment.

There are relatively few laughs -- unless you crave toilet humor -- in this direct-to-video-grade installment.

Scary Movie 4 is the second to be directed by Airplane! and The Naked Gun's David Zucker and possibly the funniest one yet.

Don't let the number scare you: Scary Movie 4 is spooferific.

Not surprisingly, the fourth installment is a total retread of its predecessor.

It's a far cry from the hilarious, edgy antics of Scary Movie, but it has about as much going for it as the first sequel.

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?

The gags are hit-and-miss, and regardless of their success, they categorically go on too long.

By the time you get to see the fourth incarnation of any movie franchise, you should be pretty sure what you're in for %u2013 and this one is true to its brand. It's corny, mischievous and more than a tad tacky in places.

High production values and seemingly endless celebrity cameos only moderately elevate the scattershot satire of the Scary Movie franchise.