Best Genre-Critiquing Movies

I was really impressed with how well 22 jump street did this

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1. Scream

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3. Cabin in the Woods

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First two that entered my mind when I saw the thread title.

Scream is definitely one of the best. And Cabin in the Woods is one of my favorite movies of the last five or ten years.

New Nightmare is also a great call. And to be fair, the Scream sequels did a pretty solid job as well and were solid in their own rights, even though the original was head and shoulders above them.

Blazing Saddles was another awesome one. As well as Spaceballs. And Monty Python/Holy Grail was great at this too.

What, no Shaun of the Dead?

I think horror is probably the most common genre for this, but I'm speculating. I personally didn't love New Nightmare, but the other two are solid examples.

There was another ridiculous action film, I can't think of the name, it had Clive Owen in it.

Would The Expendables series fall into this category? I feel like they would.

I haven't seen 22 Jump Street yet, but I remember how awesome it was in 21JS when they kept shooting the cars expecting them to blow up and they weren't. That was pretty hilarious.

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What, no Shaun of the Dead?

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Straddles that line.

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I think horror is probably the most common genre for this,

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It is, because I think Scream's critique is right on. No genre of film is more explicit about rules than horror movies were from 1973 to 1995. Really until Scream.

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I personally didn't love New Nightmare

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Any reason?

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There was another ridiculous action film, I can't think of the name, it had Clive Owen in it.

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Shoot Em Up. Good call I forgot about that one.

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Would The Expendables series fall into this category? I feel like they would.

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Although I like the movies for what they are, I would say no. Hudson Hawk and Shoot Em Up are more critical.

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Any reason?

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I think it was when I watched it. I did a Nightmare marathon around Halloween two years ago and that came towards the end. I felt like that incarnation of Freddy was such a stark departure, but I think that was the point. I think I just preferred the feel of the original two films, but I don't really think that's what Craven was going for. And it wasn't what I was looking for, if that makes sense.

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Adaptation

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Good one. As a critique on film as a whole really.

Barton Fink is similar in that regard.

Gremlins 2 was meta before most people even knew what it was in film

a lot of the Muppet movies would also fall under this category

Fight Club and Kill Bill maybe.

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Spoofing
Self-Analyzing
Swlf-Critiquing
Being "meta"
"Breaking the fourth wall"
Etc..

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To an extent, but I think there are some lines that can be navigated.

Take Spaceballs (which has more in common with the other three Brooks films) and Scream. The true goal of that film is to "make fun" of Star Wars and to a lesser extent, science fiction films. It isn't really asking questions about genre, or critiquing how the genre works. The movie is more concerned with the easy gag. There's a place for that of course, it's a fun film, but it doesn't care about the history or past of what its subject matter is. Yoda becomes Yogurt. I mean, how is that a critique? It certainly has moments, particularly the Spaceballs home video scene and franchising cash outs, but those are sandwiched between Pizza the Hut and Yogurt, and as always for Brooks, Jewish stereotypes. And Spaceballs had little effect on science fiction films at all.

On the other hand, something like Scream gets its momentum from saying, "This is how horror movies work, why do they work that way" It's literally an essay on horror films because Craven had become a little disillusioned with them. SO he says, "These are the rules," and has a character list them explicitly in the film, then his plot revolves around characters doing those exact things. Have sex...die. Leave the room, don't come right back, etc. while at the same time, proving to the audience that there are things you can do apart from the norm. It's a nice play between paying homage to a genre he helped to create and correcting the course a bit. We had a spurt of slasher movies after that, but the genre is effectively dead.

The primary concern of Spaceballs was to make you laugh by making fun of science fiction films. The primary function of Scream was to induce fear/thrills while analyzing why horror films work the way they do.

To me, there is a giant chasm there, to others, maybe not so much.