The only true saving grace of this trash heap is the hilarious impression of Tom Cruise by the infinitely talented Craig Bierko. True he doesn’t redeem the film, but surely he pulls in an awfully funny performance and keeps the lame gags worth watching if only to see what he can do when he embodies Cruise and his idiosyncrasies. There’s also the finale spoofing Cruise’s infamous appearance on “Oprah” which goes on way too long, but has an opening that’s worth a gaff or two. The spoofing of the pure stupidity of “War of the Worlds” also inspires a good laugh or two with the noting of the plot holes, and the basic skewering of the Fanning character.

I remember a time when spoofs were something of an art form. They were chaotic, they were hectic, and yet there was a certain poetry to it that possessed an innate brilliance. Films like “Airplane!,” and “Young Frankenstein” are still fantastic comedy films for the fact that writing meant everything. Sure there was toilet humor, and physical double takes, but there was also wit, and charm, and actual laughs. While the second half of these comedies never quite did the premise justice, you simply can’t deny their overall intelligence. “Scary Movie 4,” and the franchise the bred it, is one of the worst examples of this sub-genre. It’s a lazy, hackneyed, and utterly irritating mess that relies on different movies references for laughs without spinning it into comedy.

How do you spoof something that was already absurd in the first place? Steven Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds,” there’s the Asian horror genre, and the Tom Cruise Oprah fiasco, and pair that with sex jokes, and voila, instant comedy. The writers obviously depend much too often on tired outdated gags that weren’t funny when they were popular, and shockingly, they just continue to drain the talents of folks like Anna Faris, Craig Bierko (how did they rope you into this?), and Cloris Leachman respectively, and there’s not a single laugh here, no matter how hard they try with this tired material. And the creators are just a year too late with spoofs of “Million Dollar Baby,” and (ugh) “Brokeback Mountain” that results in an utterly horrifying musical number that just left me pitying movie geeks like myself who were forced to sit through this. Oh, and there are also the cumbersome Asian stereotypes that are so unfunny they’re not even offensive, but I’ll spare you a rant. “Scary Movie 4” is the worst type of comedy, it’s a lazy little product of mediocrity that will be woefully outdated in the next year; does anyone remember laughter?

How is this PG-13 when every single gag rears toward a hard R? Ah, that’s the MPAA for you. “Scary Movie 4” is on auto drive from the opening scenes with lame gags, dated puns, and utterly wasted talent that deserves better. And now for no reason at all...