Scary Movie 2  ★★

IT’S hard to watch one of my favourite edgy actors of the ’80s, James Woods, doing a cameo in the horror comedy send-up Scary Movie 2.

It’s not a bad cameo – he plays Father McFeely in an Exorcist spoof sequence at the start – and it’s certainly not as bad as seeing De Niro in Dirty Grandpa.

But still, just the act is a big disappointment. The film was made in 2001 but he has done very little since apart from some TV. In the 80s he gave a string of great performances in films like Salvador, Cop, The Boost and Videodrome and his back catalogue around that time is definitely worth exploring.

Anyway, why am I going on about James Woods when I’ve got a movie to review? Because the movie isn’t much good.

Why did I bother to watch this? I guess sometimes I just like to completely switch off. I tried to watch the first one but kept falling asleep towards the end so won’t review it as it’s not a complete watch.

The I felt guilty about giving up on that one, so decided to watch and review no 2. Well, it’s probably weaker than the original and looking at collected IMDB scores the three that follow are even worse.

Keenen Ivory Wayans directed the first two only plus his younger brothers, Shawn and Marlon, are some of the writers and also act in the films. So the blame is spread over the entire family

The first one was predominantly sending-up Scream but this one is mostly set in a haunted house. The story involves a university professor, played by Tim Curry, wanting to awaken the spirits of the house to prove the existence of the after-life. He tricks some of his students into an experiment at the house.

Yep, it makes no sense and is never mentioned again. Lead actress Anna Faris is poor again, Tim Curry does next to nothing and actors like Tori Spelling are terrible.

The one bright note is There’s Something About Mary funny man Chris Elliot (he played Woogie) who has his moments as Hanson the vile-looking caretaker. He provides three of the four laugh-out loud moments the film gave me during its 70-odd minutes.