Why was Scream the movie made?

Answer 1

Scream helped breathe new life into the classic slasher movie. Scream is not just a slasher movie, but a parody/spoof of slasher movies. It makes fun of all the old cliches that bad Horror movies -- especially bad slasher movies -- employ.

In other words, the movie was intended to be a celebration of, or an homage to, classic slasher movies like Halloween, Friday the 13th, and A Nightmare on Elm Street (A Nightmare on Elm Street, in fact, was written and directed by the same guy who wrote and directed Scream: Wes Craven).

As well as a celebration of/homage to the classic slasher movie, Scream also gently and lovingly made fun of slasher movies.

Thus, Scream not only caused horror fans to take a renewed interest in slasher movies, but also prompted the makers of such movies to stop being lazy and employing all the tired old cliches, and move onto fresh new ground.

Scream was released in 1996, during a sort of low point in horror. Nothing new was really happening with horror movies at the time. The next exciting new trend -- movies filmed with hand-held, home movie cameras, to get that realistic look -- was not to come for a few more years. The Blair Witch Project(which was the first film to be made in that realistic style, as well as the first horror film that claimed to be totally real footage) did not come out until 1999.

So, at the time, Scream was a refreshing change from a rather boring period in horror. It revived the slasher genre, which had been suffering greatly from lack of imagination and reliance on predictable cliches. It got people interested in slasher movies again, and it brought much-needed criticism to the horror genre, which forced horror movie makers to come up with fresh, new ideas.

Answer 2

Because people enjoy the endorphins of being scared.