Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy (2010)

MAY 5, 2010

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY
SOURCE: DVD (SCREENER)

(Disclaimer - For what I don’t know, but I am special thanked at the end of the film. If you think that makes me biased, then don’t read my review. Go read one of the others - they’re all positive so far!)

As I’ve said a few times over the course of revisiting all of the Nightmare On Elm St movies, Freddy was always my least favorite of the big franchises. And yet I still loved just about every minute of Never Sleep Again, an epic four hour (!) documentary about the series. For a casual fan to enjoy something that long (I only paused it to go to the bathroom and do some quick work related tasks), a big fan will probably have a heart attack with all of the information here.

The film is from many of the folks behind His Name Was Jason, but it’s not a Freddy-fied version of that film. With the exception of Jason Mewes, who appears in a brief clip mocking the “Jay” rip-off character in Freddy Vs. Jason, every single person who appears in this film is directly involved with the films. No journalists (sorry, friends), no fan filmmakers, no guy from Psych... for the four hours, you will only hear from the people you WANT to hear from if you’re sitting down to watch a documentary about Nightmare On Elm Street.

And chances are you’ll hear from your favorite character from the series, because they are also batting pretty close to a thousand in terms of getting the primary cast and crew back for new interviews. Some holdouts are probably pretty obvious (Johnny Depp) but they got every director, pretty much every writer, and at least 75% of the main cast for each film, and in some cases all - I don’t think there’s a single holdout of note from Freddy’s Revenge, Dream Master, or Dream Child. Dream Warriors is the only one with some unfortunate gaps (no Patricia Arquette, Bradley Gregg, Frank Darabont, Larry Fishburne, or Craig Wasson), and Freddy vs. Jason’s cast is largely MIA - basically just Monica Keena, Brendan Fletcher, and Zack Ward - but I could care less about that one anyway. In short, it’s the most comprehensive and complete reunion I’ve ever seen for any of these films, and that’s not counting folks from the Freddy’s Nightmares TV show, comic books, or novelizations, or various New Line personnel such as Jeff Katz, a fan who eventually worked at New Line and was instrumental in finally getting FvJ made. And I dig how each actor was introduced in the film, by reading their character’s introduction from the original screenplays for their respective films (Tina was supposed to be 15?).

I also like how it was broken down film by film, instead of by theme as the Jason doc was. Don’t like part 4? Skip over that part. Need to know what they have to say about Freddy’s Revenge right now? Cue up chapter 3. And superfluous Freddy-centric stuff, such as the video game or the large fan base, is left to disc 2. The only time in the doc that they go “off track” from the films is a brief piece about Freddy’s Nightmares, and a little eulogy for New Line, which was of course “The House That Freddy Built” and was more or less shut down in 2008 after some merging and staff overhauls.

And they’re not afraid to dish some dirt, though it’s entirely civil and “eh, water under the bridge” in tone. Yes, the gay subtext of Nightmare 2 is finally addressed (in fact, I think the section on that film is the best in the doc), with the writer admitting it was all intentional and line producer Joel Soisson confessing that he was completely naïve to not have noticed it. The rushed production of 4 and 5 is covered, though it’s largely told from 20 year old memories instead of actual on-set evidence, since they didn’t have full time DVD crews back then. There is a priceless, but brief, shot of Englund getting frustrated with some delays on the set of 4 - I would have loved more stuff like that, but it probably just doesn’t exist. And while I don’t want to get ahead of myself, if you’re wandering what they think of the idea of remaking the film (the film proper ignores it), then be sure to check out the “Extended Interviews” on Disc 2.

Now, I have to dip into “guy” mode for a paragraph here, because these movies were very seminal in my pre-pubescent “discovering girls” years. I am quite sure that Stacey Alden (the nurse) in Nightmare 3 is the first pair of breasts that I ever saw, and I had big crushes on Taryn (Jennifer Rubin) and Alice (Lisa Wilcox) back then. And so, while I love hearing all of the stories and anecdotes, I am also curious to see what these ladies look like nowadays. Some haven’t aged particularly well, others aren’t even recognizable (Tuesday Knight is one “that’s HER?” example), and at least one has apparently become a goth clown with a submissive (I’m not kidding), but I think fans of Amanda Wyss, Jennifer Rubin, Kim Myers, and Brooke Theiss (and yes, Ms. Alden) will be quite pleased with how gracefully these women have aged in the 20-25 years since they first “impressed” kids like myself. Of course, this just makes it all the more depressing to see how bad implants and such have wrecked the looks of some of the others, when they’re talking back to back.

As for our beloved Nancy, Heather Langenkamp needs to fire whoever did her makeup for her interviews. She has her own documentary coming out, which is previewed on disc 2, and there we can see that she’s still a very naturally pretty woman, but during her interviews she has horrid makeup and a bad tan, which is a shame. Oh, and on the male side of things, Jsu Garcia practically looks the same, and many of the other guys look about what you’d expect them to after this much time, but some are damn near unrecognizable - I’m still not convinced that it’s really Shon Greenblatt (John from Freddy’s Dead) talking in those segments.

Back on less chauvinistic topic, even if you don’t like a particular movie, you’re bound to enjoy the segment on it (if not more so as you’re likely to get a new perspective on its production). I mean, I have zero love for Dream Master, but hearing how Renny Harlin fought to get the job was a nice story (especially today, where our new Nightmare film is directed by a snobby douchebag who turned it DOWN 2-3x before being convinced by the almighty power of Michael Bay), and it’s good to know that Rodney Eastman (Joey) agrees with my sentiment that recasting Kristen hurt the film’s storytelling. I know the four hour length may be a bit daunting for some, and I’m sure it could be pared down some (especially with the 2nd disc providing more interview space), but trust me, you won’t want to skip over any of it. If you start getting sick of hearing the words “New Line” or “Much darker than the previous film”, just take a break.

Because, see, even with "Fangoria", the previous DVDs, convention Q&As, and all the other stuff I’ve read/listened to over the years, Never Sleep Again still offers some trivia you probably didn’t know, and skimming over a few minutes might result in missing out on some pretty jaw-dropping trivia. Do you know who was originally cast as Freddy, to the point where he even had makeup tests on him (which we see)? I won’t spoil it, but it’s a fascinating “What if?” scenario. I also didn’t know that Englund was briefly replaced on Nightmare 2 (over salary disputes, a problem that runs throughout the series when it comes to returning cast OR crew) with a stuntman, and we get to see the horrible results for a few precious seconds.

We also get some tantalizingly brief rejected script excerpts from time to time:

Bet you’ll never guess who wrote that colorful line.

I also want to make a special mention of the kick-ass stop motion animation that punctuates each section of the film (not to mention a lengthy credit sequence). It’s sort of like the brief stop motion stuff we saw in Dream Warriors (Phillip’s death), and both the animation itself and the impressive detail in the miniature sets are worth a look even if you hate Freddy. I just wish disc 2 had provided some information on their creation or an interview with Michael Granberry, who was responsible for the pieces. In fact, I wouldn't have minded hearing from any of the folks involved with putting the film together. Yes, I want a documentary about the documentary.

And Wes admits he uses booby traps too much in his movies and had to force himself to stop. That alone made the movie worth my while.

Disc 2 is loaded with another 2 hrs of unused interview pieces (once again broken down by film). They aren’t “finished”, in that they still have the green-screen backgrounds and aren’t edited together with clips, which is a bit of a bummer at times, as the talent will be discussing a particular shot and I won’t know exactly what they are talking about, but the information presented here is no more or less interesting than what’s in the finished film. The rest of the stuff is a mixed bag - I really dug the focused look on the poster art and the music/scores from each film, but I could have done without the “Angry Video Game Nerd” segment (again, Zero Punctuation is the alpha and omega of hilariously bitter video game reviews), and stuff like “For The Love Of The Glove” will just reassure ignorant people’s fears that horror fans are psychotic (the dude scares ME for Christ’s sake). And “A Nightmare On Elm Street In 10 Minutes” is just the actors saying their famous lines in sequence, which isn’t nearly as amusing as having Joe Lynch and Adam Green summarize the series as they did for the Jason doc (which is what I thought this piece was going to be, since it had the same title scheme). The “actors saying their old lines” thing is cute, but the end credits of the feature had it as well, once was enough for me. Again though, I’m not a die hard fan; I’d probably listen to 5 hrs’ worth of Halloween actors doing the same thing without complaining.

As I mentioned, there’s also a preview for Langenkamp’s documentary I Am Nancy, which just seems like it will be kind of a depressing movie as it shows things like her sitting at a table without anyone coming up to her (as Englund’s line grows and grows at the next table). I assume the entire movie isn’t this much of a bummer, but either way I can’t say it got me really excited to see it. However, it does seem to be a completely self-financed production, and will likely have a personal touch that the NSA doc can not provide, so it might be worth a look once it’s complete.

With eight full hours of content, the purchase of this disc is a no-brainer if you’re a Freddy fan, even a casual one. It’s a bit ironic that a documentary about the films is more compelling and interesting than some of the sequels, but since arguing over which films are better than others is an important part of being a horror fan, it’s invaluable to more or less have the people who made them offer their unfiltered thoughts on the matter. Kudos to all involved for finding everyone (Mark Patton was particularly elusive, from what I understand) and keeping the film focused on the Nightmare team.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010)

APRIL 30, 2010

GENRE: SLASHER, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (REGULAR SCREENING)

So far, I have gotten at least some enjoyment out of every Platinum Dunes production. I genuinely like their first four films (the two Chainsaws, Amityville, and of course The Hitcher), and thought Friday was problematic but at least better than the last 4-5 Jason movies. Hell, I even liked the first 45 minutes or so of The Unborn and a few moments here and there of The Horsemen. But A Nightmare On Elm Street did absolutely nothing for me. Not once in its entire 95 minute runtime was I given any reason to care about a single thing on the screen, and the only emotion I ever felt was anger every time the script by Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer insulted my intelligence.

Unlike Friday, this one follows the plot of the original fairly closely in a general sense, and even recycles a few names (Nancy, and even a Jesse), and the Kris character is a complete copy of the original's Tina (right down to the body bag school hallway nightmare). Some key moments are re-staged, such as Freddy's glove rising out of the bathwater, Kris/Tina's death, and her boyfriend being blamed for it, etc. As I've said before, this is not my preferred way of going about a remake - keeping the basic concept is fine, but redoing major scenes just seems lazy. But it's twice as bad here, because a lot of the "iconic" things that they repeat don't actually make sense in the context of this story, which has some major changes (which I will now "spoil", so turn away if you don't want the film's ill-conceived "twist" "ruined").

This time around, Freddy is not a child murderer, he's a child molester. So then why would he still have a razor sharp glove? Wouldn't he have trouble doing his thing with a bunch of knives for a hand? We get a glimpse or two of him cutting the children, but this just seems like an excuse to justify the glove, since it doesn't really make any sense (why would he cause visible harm to the children if he intended to keep his sick habits a secret?). They also repeatedly bring back the boiler room, which also has no significance to the plot as Freddy died in a warehouse and took the children into a hidden room.

That's just one of the major idiotic holes in this script. We are also expected to believe that the parents would (very poorly) hide incriminating evidence that depicts what happened to their children, despite the attempt to keep them from knowing about it (one even keeps a sliced up shirt, in a box labeled "Kids stuff" or something of that nature, right in the middle of the attic). And there's an unexplained throwaway line that no one knows Freddy existed, but if that's the case then why did the school get closed down, if there was no known crime? And why didn't anyone remove things from the school when they closed it to boot? Our heroes go there at the end of the movie and there are parts of his glove in plain sight.

And why even go after the kids? The parents were the ones who killed him, but again, he wasn't a murderer this time around. In the original series, we just assume he's finishing what he started (killing off the Elm Street kids), but there doesn't seem to be any purpose for killing them here while leaving the parents alone. Then again, maybe he DID - it seems everyone only has a single parent; the Nancy standin has a mom (Connie Britton, completely wasted) but no Donald Thompson replacement. Clancy Brown is the apparently single dad of Kyle Gallner's character, but he is ALSO wasted - they should have just combined Brown and Britton into one character, so they'd only be wasting one good actor instead of two.

The kids are a dreadfully boring lot too, and for some reason it seems the more dull the actor, the longer they live. Kellan Lutz seems interesting (not to mention the only one who looks like he could take Freddy), but he dies in the first scene. Katie Cassidy (in her third remake at least, after When A Stranger Calls and Black Xmas) and Thomas Dekker are at least competent, and they have a previous relationship that is hinted at, but they die off in the first half as well. That leaves Gallner and the cute but woefully boring Rooney Mara (sister of Kate), neither of whom manage to create interesting heroes, and they barely have any chemistry either. And despite being in the entire movie, neither of them have any character development whatsoever - Mara jokingly asks Gallner what his favorite color is, and I swear it's supposed to be a "fuck you" to the audience for expecting them to try to create a character we would get to know a little and thus care what happens to them. And they're all incredibly dour people. Think about the original, with Johnny Depp screwing around with the tape player trying to convince his mom he was at his cousin's, or Nick Corri playing a prank on them - they were believable, enjoyable characters. These goons are all bitter (or in Nancy's case, just plain dull) even before Freddy comes along. I defy anyone to give me one reason why we should even care about Nancy, let alone the others.

And it might sound stupid, but the movie suffers greatly from an over-abundance of nightmare scenes. I swear, more than 50% of the movie takes place in the dream world, to the extent where it became more of a surprise when a scene was actually really happening. Not only does it get dull, it also makes Freddy less of a threat, because everyone falls asleep, encounters Freddy, and survives at least 3 times before finally getting killed (even Lutz, in his 5 minutes of screentime, manages to escape once). To their credit, they keep his jokes to a minimum (and they're a bit darker in tone to boot), but ultimately he's even less threatening than the quipster Freddy from Dream Master.

As for Haley, well, he's OK I guess. With a script this terrible, it's hard to tell if he's just a lousy Freddy or if the script prevented him from being a good one. His diminutive size is definitely a problem - not that he needs to be a hulking brute, but he should at least look menacing compared to the very petite Thomas Dekker. And the makeup is frigging awful; he looks like a hamster in a hat.

The one good thing I can say about the movie is that it's at least competently shot by Samuel Bayer and Jeff Cutter. The widescreen imagery (all of the original Freddy movies were 1.85:1) is quite nice, and there are a few nice visuals to enjoy, such as when Cassidy falls asleep in her classroom and it turns into decrepit ash around her. And the nightmare scenes are believable, instead of the high concept style of the later sequels. Had there not been about 30 nightmare scenes, it would actually be hard to tell when one was occurring, because they are thankfully grounded in reality, or at least, with fantastical elements kept to a minimum (no comic book avenger or "roach motel" scenes here).

And, not to knock anyone's intelligence, but the concept of Nightmare on Elm Street is really just too heady for Platinum Dunes' brand of horror. Wes Craven's original film is rich with philosophical ideas; this one has sound-based jolt scares every five minutes. The film does nothing to reflect the current times - Gallner's character is on Ritalin, but that's about it. Nowadays, in addition to a highly medicated world, we hear stories about kids staying up playing video games for so long that they actually die, suicides because of internet bullying, etc, all of which could be tied into Freddy's world in interesting ways, because there SHOULD be some real world explanation for the kills in the movie, but they're all skipped over in favor of more boring "micro-nap" sequences. A good filmmaker team working with a creative script could have made a fantastic Nightmare movie, instead they all just settled for doing the absolute bare minimum.

Hilariously, the film's opening credits serve as a metaphor for the entire movie. Over some chalk drawings of strange things, we see all of the credits scrawled onto the pavement. It's a cool concept. But for whatever reason, they put regular Times New Roman (or whatever) credits over them. Which is just like the movie itself - a creative idea (not their OWN idea, but still) obscured by pointless, lowest common denominator blandness.

I usually don't actually encourage people to not see a movie, but this is one time I will. This is the worst type of remake, where they clearly didn't actually have any real ideas, but wanted to make money off the title and concept. It's a cynically made movie from start to finish, and as soulless a major horror film as I can recall (only Stepfather 2009 may be more creatively bankrupt). The optimist in me would like to think that if the film is a major box office failure, that Andrew Form and Brad Fuller will rethink their business strategy and start making low budget horror films again (remake or not), made by people who genuinely want to make them. Marcus Nispel was jonesing to take on Chainsaw - and it turned out pretty good (IMO). Samuel Bayer actually turned this movie down 2-3x before Michael Bay convinced him to do it (I'm guessing with hookers). And they actually tell this story as if it's a good thing. Maybe next time they'll work harder to generate a good script instead of apparently spending all of their energy trying to convince a guy to direct a bad one.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Non Canon Review: Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994)

APRIL 21, 2010

GENRE: SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)
LAST SEEN: 1999 (DVD)

In my early teen years, my local theater proved to be a terrible indicator of how well a movie was performing elsewhere. Wes Craven’s New Nightmare is the least financially successful entry in the entire series, ultimately selling only a few more tickets in its entire run than Freddy’s Dead did in its first weekend. But you could have fooled me, seeing the film in a sold out (some people were standing) screening on Saturday night, with fans running around and generally having a grand old time. It was the first time I had gone to a movie and seen a genuine REACTION in the crowd, not unlike you’d see for the opening night of a Star Wars movie or whatever. Ironically, it was the same sort of atmosphere Craven would create for the opening scene of Scream 2, which played with a lot of the same themes that New Nightmare did.

But the film is actually far less meta than some might expect. After the opening scene (which is just a nightmare), there isn’t really any of the “Freddy goes after the people who make Freddy movies” stuff, which was I originally thought the movie was about. In fact, and this is possibly part of the theme, the only people Freddy kills in the movie (four, though we only see two) are also pretty much the only people playing wholly fictional characters - Freddy doesn’t kill John Saxon or Wes Craven. When I mentioned that I was watching the film over Twitter, a colleague commented that he was disappointed that the film didn’t offer a Freddy vs. Robert Englund scene, but I actually appreciate that. When I was 14 I’m sure it would have blown my mind, but I think movies like Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back (which - WHOA! - has Wes Craven playing himself as well) have soured me on that sort of thing. The best thing about New Nightmare is that it’s actually pretty smart, instead of being cute to make the audience laugh once and never again.

Actually, the most clever joke in the movie might not even be one. Early on, Heather Langenkamp (Heather Langenkamp) is at a funeral for her husband, and a few of her Nightmare co-stars are there for support, such as Nick Corri and... Tuesday Knight? Now, Knight was in Dream Master, and Langenkamp was not. BUT, Knight was replacing Patricia Arquette, who DID work with Ms. Langenkamp in Dream Warriors. So is Tuesday Knight actually “playing” Patricia Arquette in this scene? Is she replacing her in real life? It’s a philosophical sight gag! I mean, it’s not like any of the Nightmare folks are high demand actors (save for Johnny Depp, who Wes was too afraid to ask to be in the movie, which is odd since Depp did a cameo for Freddy’s Dead despite not owing Rachel Talalay a goddamn thing), so they could have had any number of people in this scene, which makes me suspect that Knight’s appearance is more than just a random shoutout for fans.

One thing the movie definitely could have used was a more tyrannical editor. Don’t get me wrong - Patrick Lussier is a fantastic editor - the scares work, the action bits are well constructed, etc. But the movie is just too long (barely under two hours - with only two kill scenes!), and 10 minutes or so could have been pared down easily. There are WAYYYY too many earthquakes in the film, to the point where it’s practically a xenophobic depiction of the phenomenon. I’ve lived here for 4.5 years, but I haven’t seen/felt as many quakes as these folks do over the course of a week. There’s a scene early on, pretty much the first real scene of the movie, where Langenkamp is getting ready to leave for a TV interview, and it just goes on forever - cutting the earthquake out of this scene alone could have helped matters. And the earthquake stuff doesn’t seem to be part of the actual plot (i.e. Freddy isn’t causing them), so I’m not sure why it’s such a presence in the movie.

I also wish he had cast an unknown in the role of Dylan. While Miko Hughes is a terrific child actor, it was sort of hard to buy into the “this is the real world” thing when I recognized the kid from like 3-4 other movies (including another creepy kid hallmark, Pet Sematary). The guy playing Langenkamp’s husband was an unknown (at least to me), so that worked, but whenever they showed the kid freaking out all I could think of was “No fair, Daddy.”

But I loved the overall concept, that Freddy was just the latest embodiment of evil, and that the Freddy in the other 6 movies was essentially keeping it at bay, only to be set loose “for real” when Freddy was killed off in the last movie (once again, the ending of Freddy’s Dead proves to be a disservice to the world). And I like how Englund, Craven, etc are only in a scene or two each, so we can focus on Langenkamp and her son. Not only does it help separate the film from the others, but it, perhaps ironically, gives the series its first true hero since Nancy in the first film. 3-5 were basically ensembles, and Freddy’s Dead was split between John and Maggie. And Freddy's Revenge... well, let’s just ignore that one. But this is Langenkamp’s show start to finish (the only time she’s not onscreen is during those two kill scenes), giving us someone to truly care about instead of just stringing together a bunch of kill/nightmare scenes.

On the commentary, Wes talks about how it’s pretty much the only film of his career that isn’t compromised in any way. He was allowed final cut as long as the film scored a certain number in test screenings, which it apparently easily surpassed. And the MPAA left him alone as well. He also points out that the horror movie-hating nurse is named after Richard Heffner, the then-head of the “censorship board”, a joke I never picked up on (Jack Valenti was the guy in charge when I started paying attention to such things). And I must extend some kudos to Wes for not soapboxing about such matters throughout the film, as he easily could have given the nature of the plot. It’s obviously been a sore spot for him throughout his career, but he basically keeps his thoughts on the matter to himself, settling for just using the Heffner name. In fact, Langenkamp’s real life stalker, which was part of the basis for the film, wasn’t a fan of the Nightmare movies but of her sitcom Just The Ten Of Us, which I’m also surprised he didn’t find a way to point out (i.e. that people are crazy/obsessive over everything/anything, not just horror). He also talks about how he wanted to redesign Freddy a bit to make him darker, though I’m not sure how making his hat green (from brown) qualifies as making him darker. I hate that fucking green hat.

The Nightmare Encyclopedia disc (aka Disc 8 on the boxed set) offers about 15 minutes’ worth of interview with Craven, where he talks about how he got into filmmaking, why he came back, etc. Nothing particularly earth-shattering, fans will already know his backstory and he goes into much more detail on the Freddy stuff on the commentary. However, he does point out that he couldn’t follow the later sequels (we’re with ya!), which is pretty funny/sad. The original teaser trailer is also included on this disc, which is worth a look because of how much the documentary approach was played up on the trailer vs. how it was actually depicted in the film (not at all unless you count the largely hand-held camerawork), and doesn’t even include Freddy coming out and saying “Miss me?”, a moment in the film that seems like it was designed specifically for a trailer. In fact, Freddy doesn’t really appear in the trailer at all, which makes me wonder if there was ever a more traditional trailer, because if not, it’s no wonder that the movie didn’t do that well - the trailer basically only makes sense if you’ve already seen the movie. Weird.

So now I’ve come to the end of my pre-remake Nightmare retrospective. It’s interesting to see how my opinions have changed since my last viewing on pretty much all of the movies, with the exception of this one, which I really liked then and I really like now. My final ranking is: 3/1, 7, 2, 6, 5, 4/FvJ (pre-retrospective was 3/1, 7, 4, 2, 5, 6, FvJ). I just hope I can at LEAST say “Better than Freddy vs Jason” about the reboot.

What say you?

P.S. I used to have the novelization for this movie, but it’s nowhere to be found. I remember the author tried to join in on the meta-fun, in that it was about him being hired to write the novelization, or something? Maybe it was just an epilogue. Anyone have it? Worth yelling at my mom for selling it for 25 cents or whatever (she had a big yard sale when I was away at school and many a “I still NEED that!” item was forever lost)?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Non Canon Review: Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991)

APRIL 15, 2010

GENRE: SLASHER, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)
LAST SEEN: 1999 (DVD)

Things were pretty awesome in September of 1991, because I got to see two R rated horror movies in theaters practically back to back (my first ones, at that - my only previous theatrical horror experience was the PG-13 Poltergeist II). First was Child’s Play 3, which I got to see on its first showing on opening day, as it was the last week of summer vacation before I went back to school. So when Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare opened, I had to “wait” until Saturday afternoon to see it. Stupid school! Sadly this would end my streak; I think the next horror movie I got to see in theaters was Pet Semetary 2, in August of 1992.

I’ve gone back and forth on the film more than any other in the series. Seeing it on the big screen was a big thrill, and thus I “loved” it. But then I started thinking it really wasn’t all that good, only to like it again after a couple of viewings on VHS. And the last time, I REALLY didn’t like it, to the extent where I considered it the worst one. But now I kind of like it again. I dunno what it is about this goddamn movie that I can never really pick an opinion on it. Ask me again in 10 years and I may hate it.

What I like about it is that it’s the first film in the series that managed to be kind of creepy even when Freddy wasn’t around. The entire sequence where they go to Springwood, with its childless, possibly insane residents wandering about, is wonderfully strange (with a clear Twin Peaks influence), and I wish they could have stayed there for the whole movie. I also liked that the characters were actually kind of funny for once instead of just Freddy - John’s “Nothing will get me about of this bed!” bit is still worth a chuckle. Hell, even Freddy managed to make me laugh for once, when he’s dancing around and generally being an asshole behind the deaf kid.

Oh yeah, there’s some goddamn blood in the movie too. Deaf kid’s head explodes, and John gets impaled by a bed of spikes. And in one of the nightmare scenes, one of our heroines bashes her abusive father with an iron, resulting in a pretty kick ass effect. As with Dream Child, there’s only three deaths in the entire movie (all dudes too - has to be a first for a horror movie), but the less convoluted plot and genuinely interesting backstory keeps it from being an issue. And since only one of those deaths is worth watching (the deaf kid), maybe it’s for the best. Another excruciating death sequence like the one for Spence (Breckin Meyer!) could have killed this movie for good - it’s by far the absolute worst/most annoying sequence in the entire series.

I can’t recall if there was any uproar about Freddy having a daughter - it’s true that she was never mentioned before, but no one ever said he DIDN’T have one either. Most of his backstory either involved his conception or the final days of his human life, so there was never any reason to go into his stint as a family man anyway. And it makes sense - if he was killing kids for a while, I would assume that it’s because no one thought to suspect a guy with a wife and a kid of his own. A janitor who lived alone probably would have been suspected right off the bat, no? And I really liked the mystery as to which of our two (three if you count Tracy, though she was an obvious red herring to me even when I was 11 and didn’t yet know what a red herring was) characters was Freddy’s child. Unlike the previous two films, Rachel Talalay and Michael De Luca’s script pulls off the Psycho twist quite well - John really is our connection to the film, but Maggie was developed enough to easily take over the film once he died at the end of the 2nd act. It was a great surprise.

Oh yeah, those last two films? They’re not mentioned. Alice and Jacob aren’t around, and when Freddy lists off the different ways he’s been “killed”, he doesn’t mention being torn apart by the souls inside of his body, or... well, whatever the hell happened at the end of Dream Child. They also don’t even bother explaining his resurrection this time around - he just shows up in John’s nightmare (there’s a thing about how he’s the last Elm Street kid, which would also make more sense if you ignore the last two films). Innovation released a 6 issue comic series that sort of bridges the two films, but after reading it on the official NOES website, I can assure you you’re not missing much. The story was needlessly convoluted, involving Alice, Jacob, Dr. Gordon, Nancy, the Dream Warriors, Dan, Yvonne, etc. And it STILL doesn’t explain where John came from anyway, so it’s wholly unnecessary unless you love “funny” Freddy, as he just delivers pun after pun throughout the story, stopping only to deliver clunky exposition that rivals his nonsense in FvJ.

A “timeless” soundtrack rears its ugly head again, after the largely song-free Dream Child (the Kool Moe Dee rap song played over the end credits, remember). But it’s kind of amusing to hear pre-power ballad-only Goo Goo Dolls, who have two songs in the film, which is probably why the film finally got a soundtrack release in the mid 90s, at the height of the Dolls’ popularity thanks to their hit “Name”. Iggy Pop’s closing credits title tune is pretty far from a toe-tapper, but it’s better than the rap stuff, and plays over a montage featuring highlights from the previous movies (even 2, which was otherwise ignored throughout the entire series). And in keeping with series tradition, the film opens with a quote, only this time it’s followed by one from Freddy Krueger (“Welcome to prime time, bitch!”). Unlike Jason Goes To Hell, this “final” entry really catered to the fan base with these sort of shout-outs, instead of completely ignoring the bulk of the series and sending off its killer in a movie in which he barely appeared.

I do wish the ending was a bit better. It’s a bit anticlimactic to go to the “bring him into the real world” well, since that’s what they did in the first one (though Nancy was actually still dreaming that whole time, so I guess it’s OK), but that they just blow him up is kind of weak. And not even in Springwood at that! If you’re going to kill Freddy fucking Krueger, you gotta do it in an iconic fashion AND setting - not with a homemade pipe bomb in the basement of some halfway house.

Maybe this wasn’t the intention though. According to a (post-release) Fango article, the ending sequence was originally much more elaborate, but it had to be toned down due to the 3D eating up so much of the budget and time. If you ask me it wasn’t worth it - even in theaters (this was my first 3D experience) it was hardly amazing, and it doesn’t work at all at home. I mean, the gimmick was that Freddy was finally being killed - did it really need 3D on top of that? Plus, the idea that Maggie needs to wear 3-D glasses in her dream never makes any sense (nor does her laughable explanation that she’s still seeing things the way she does in her dream - so you’re seeing real life in three dimensions? WHOA!). If anything it sort of detracted from the experience - here we are, killing off one of movie-dom’s all time great monsters, and I’m too busy fiddling with a piece of cardboard so I can see it right, and looking at background/foreground depth instead of what’s happening.

Speaking of those Fango articles, it’s funny to see how the style of the magazine evolved just from reading the respective articles for the past 3 NOES movies. Whereas the articles on Dream Master and Dream Child were loaded with dirt and people complaining (Englund flat out says he doesn’t like the scripts for either film - in the article ostensibly promoting it!), the Freddy’s Dead articles are all happy and sunshine-y, with even comments about the previous films kept largely positive (basically just “this one’s going to be even better!”). There is also a lack of context or insight to the pieces for this film - nothing about why it ignores those films, why they had 3D in the first place, or even why they decided to kill Freddy off for good (heh) this time around. It’s all fluff, and it would just get worse over the years (I can barely even read any recent issue; when they’re not completely spoiling movies with photos and set visit descriptions, they’re ass-kissing all upcoming films and judging all others based on their box office performance). I guess you could say the glory days of Fango died along with Freddy, except they never really came back (ironic footnote - the magazine just underwent a massive overhaul, including a new editor - just as the new NOES film is about to hit theaters! Hopefully the mag will have a creative resurgence).

Back to the movie though: overall, I like more about it than I don’t like, which I guess qualifies it as a success. I think it improved on the previous two films, and it’s certainly more successful than Jason Goes To Hell (which is the only other definitive “final” horror franchise entry I can think of - there was never a Halloween: Michael Myers Dies At The End or Leatherface’s Last Massacre). And its box office success allowed for the daring and mostly great New Nightmare, so thanks for being pretty good and a total lie, Freddy’s Dead!

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Non Canon Review: A Nightmare On Elm St 5: The Dream Child (1989)

APRIL 5, 2010

GENRE: SLASHER, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)
LAST SEEN: 1999 (DVD)

I honestly think this is only the 3rd, MAYBE 4th time I have watched A Nightmare On Elm St 5: The Dream Child (the 5 only appears on the cover/poster, for the record; the film leaves it out). I can’t remember if I only saw it a single time as a kid, prior to the DVD release in 1999 (which would have been my 2nd or 3rd viewing). I just never liked it - it was confusing, lacking kills (only 3 in the entire movie! Even the original had more if you count Nancy’s mother. And those had blood/scares), and simply not as fun as the others.

But in my eyes, it’s moved a notch above The Dream Master with this most recent viewing, because while I stand by all of the previous claims, it’s at least TRYING to be interesting, unlike Renny Harlin’s entry. It’s got some good ideas, such as the concept of Freddy using the dreams of the unborn baby to get at the others while they were awake (according to Fangoria articles, he was actually trying to be REBORN through the baby, but if this concept made it into the finished film, it doesn’t come across). And even though they don’t really do anything with it, I liked that all of the kids had “overbearing parent” issues, which was nice after the last film, where most of them didn’t even seem to HAVE parents. And the cynic in me enjoys the irony in this, since the “kids” here are all obviously in their 20s, with Danny Hassel being the youngest at 22 (the dude playing Mark was 29!). Move out and get a job if you don’t like your parents! You’re almost old enough to be President!

And the humor has been toned down ever so slightly; had they kept this pace Freddy would have been scary again by part 8 or so. Granted, the fact that there are only three kills in the entire movie (seriously, who the hell greenlit this body count? Of all the producers and writers on this thing, no one ever said “Hey, we need more than one kill per act, please”?) keeps Freddy and his quips to a minimum by design, but he’s largely joke-less during the finale. Of course, this means he has to double up during the kills; during the scene where he kills Dan, he just begins shouting things at random: “Fuel injection! Power drive! Fast lane!” What? And the less said about “Super Freddy!”, the better.

Actually I take that back, because I want to know who added this into the movie. It doesn’t seem to be Leslie Bohem, who was writing a script based on a general outline by New Line (as were John Skipp and Craig Spector, who weren’t aware of Bohem’s script (and vice versa) until much later). The (88 page!) novelization by Joseph Locke says “based on the script by Leslie Bohem” without mentioning anyone else. It’s pretty much the same, but some of the character dynamics are changed (Greta seems to be into Mark in the book) and the dialogue is largely different than the film. But Mark’s kill is missing both SuperFreddy and Mark’s idiotic “Phantom Prowler” or whatever the hell he was called, and thus it’s a far better scene. The kill is essentially the same - Freddy slashes a paper version of Mark - but it doesn’t have the goofy visual of a guy dressed like a combo Iron Fist and Punisher shooting at a musclebound Freddy, who is shouting things like “More powerful than a local madman”. In the book, Freddy mocks Mark’s dead friends, saying “Deader than your friend Greta”, which is not only funnier but also cruel, thus more fitting to the original character. Remember when this guy molested kids? So obviously, all this stupid crap was added to the script draft later than the one Locke was working from.

Note - I might be persuaded to think he was merely toning it down and trying to improve on the script, but he’s either a lousy writer or doing the half-assedly half-assed job in half-assed history. Example: “Last year, after the deaths of her brother and friends, Alice thought nothing good would happen to her again. But that had changed.” - that isn’t from the synopsis, it’s on the 2nd page of the 1st chapter. Granted, I would be tried for war crimes in grammar court because of my reviews, but my shit’s free. I paid 2 bucks for this rubbish.

Bohem might be the one to blame for the fact that Alice only has about two lines in the movie, repeated over and over with minimal variation. Every time she opens her mouth its either “It was Krueger, he’s back!” or “How can he be getting to me when I’m awake?”. Her acquired skills from being the Dream Master have seemingly vanished (though the novel has her turning into a motorcycle thanks to Dan - I’m not making this up), which adds some weight to my theory that making someone the lead protagonist for two horror movies in a row is probably not a good idea (all due respect to Ms. Wilcox, and Jamie Lee, and Neve Campbell, etc).

See, it’s one thing to bring someone back years later, like Nancy in Nightmare 3 - but they had to have grown/changed as a character in a positive way, and they also need a surrogate in their former position, such as head Dream Warrior Kristen Parker. Here, we get Yvonne (Kelly Jo Minter), Alice’s new best friend, who like Alice only has a few lines in the movie, mostly variations on “It’s impossible for someone to attack you in your dream!”. Alice doesn’t really pass the torch to Yvonne as much as awkwardly hold it with her. Also, Yvonne really only becomes more significant to the story due to a lack of options - it’s not until the others are all dead that she begins to have any scenes to herself.

And in a really odd move, Yvonne not only survives Freddy (in the film’s best nightmare sequence no less - when her diving board becomes his razor fingers), but spends the climax in the real world. While Alice battles Freddy in the dream world, Yvonne goes to the sanitarium and finds Amanda Krueger’s body inside one of the rooms, and once she touches it the body disappears, putting Amanda’s soul at rest and allowing her to help Alice defeat Freddy. Or at least, that’s what I THINK is happening; the movie is so damn convoluted I had to draw a lot of my own conclusions just so my brain didn’t explode. If I’m right, this causes a pretty big logic/plot hole, since Dream Warriors clearly showed that she was buried.

Speaking of plot holes, the book thankfully removes (or never had access to the script pages for) the scene where Mark and Alice research Freddy. I don’t buy this for either character. Mark is a big nerd who is into fantastical fiction - the fact that there was a guy killing people in their dreams IN HIS OWN TOWN never got back to him? And for Alice it’s even stupider - granted things were a bit hectic when it was happening, but in the year after the guy killed her brother and her friends (and thinking nothing good would ever happen to her again), she never bothered to look into this guy? Come on. This also means we once again have to hear the story about who he was and how he died, which is counter productive for this movie since it just re-establishes the fact that Freddy no longer has any reason to go after her.

And since when does he need Alice to “bring” him victims? One could argue that if Mark and the others really had never heard of Freddy that he couldn’t appear in their dreams, but it didn’t stop him from bothering Nancy and Tina in the original film. Is he just too weak now to appear to those who aren’t yet aware of him? If that’s the case, then it should be the main focus of the film, and Alice should kill herself in order to put him down for good and spare Springwood any more deaths (and seriously, where the hell are the cops? None of them are suspicious that a year later, the same girl who survived a bloodbath is losing all of her friends again?).

In a visual sense, this one is improved over Harlin’s bright and shiny entry. Stephen Hopkins (lifetime pass from Judgment Night) uses a lot of blues and blacks, and stages some great visual setpieces, particularly the Escher-esque climax. He also tosses in a lot of animation; in addition to Mark’s comic book death, there are some oddly animated insects to enjoy, and the claws in the pool scene seem to have a stop-motion quality to them. And whoever designed the tree-pants is obviously a genius:

Freddy’s makeup (by original artist David Miller) is less successful though. It’s not a bad appliance or anything, but you can see too much of Robert Englund in it, which makes it look a little goofy (Dream Warriors still has the best look, I think). And once again, the kills are pretty tame with the red stuff, though this time it’s definitely the fault of the MPAA. In fact, the film’s VHS release was unrated, but New Line opted to put the theatrical cut on the DVD (you know, now that I’m thinking about it, this set is just as lackluster as Paramount’s Jason box, if not even more so - New Line actually HAS an unrated version of this film put together and chose to put the theatrical cut on the DVD. And NONE of the sequels have any commentary tracks, whereas 3, 6, 7 and 8 did on the Friday box).

I also dug the score, which sort of had a Harold Faltermeyer feel to it at times. The main Freddy theme doesn’t appear much, but I’ll take ANY score over wall to wall rock/pop songs. The end credits have a truly awful rap song playing over them though, so I guess it evens out.

My notes say “Top before > one creator”. I haven’t the slightest fucking clue what that is supposed to mean. Fitting with most of this movie’s plot elements.

So it’s a mess, but a seemingly well-meaning one. It’s the least successful film of the series, financially, but that doesn’t mean anything to me - the two highest grossing ones (Freddy vs Jason and Nightmare 4) are lousy too. Had the film’s writers been given time to solidify their concepts (the script was still being written while the movie was already being shot), and if Englund had exercised some of the clout he had to have built up by this point and kept them from ruining his character (it’s funny reading the Fango articles, even then he’s clearly unhappy with the direction the series took), it might have been one of the better ones, and maybe it wouldn’t have taken me twenty years (and its accrued general understanding/appreciation of film on a technical level) to realize it’s actually a slight improvement over its predecessor, albeit not nearly enough to save the series.

Now, will I like Freddy’s Dead more than I did last time around? Tune in next week!

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Non Canon Review: A Nightmare On Elm St 4: The Dream Master (1988)

MARCH 29, 2010

GENRE: SLASHER, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)
LAST SEEN: 1999 (DVD)

I still remember begging my mom to take me to see Nightmare on Elm St 4: The Dream Master in theaters, but it was not to be - not only was it too nice out (I asked while we were in Maine at a summer campground/resort - I think sitting on the beach or by the lake would be far more preferable than driving 30 miles to the nearest theater for a movie called Nightmare on Elm St 4: The Dream Master), but at that point she was not taking me to R rated films. She’d rent them though, and thus like all good moms, rented the film for me when it hit VHS six months later (you see kids, back in my day, we’d have to WAIT to see a movie on video if we missed it in theaters, whereas nowadays anything over 3 months after its theatrical release is considered “too long).

But had I seen it in theaters, I probably would have been blown away. I didn’t go to the movies much (based on what I can remember, I only went to the movies four times in 1988 - Beetlejuice, Roger Rabbit, Big, and Twins), and thus every movie I did go see I usually loved (I think Hook was the first movie I went to see that I didn’t like). And Nightmare 4 is filled with the type of stuff that would have appealed to me as a kid - “funny” wisecracks, a few boob shots that were brief (and out of nowhere) enough for me to see before my mom made me cover my eyes, a fast pace, and a bright, colorful aesthetic that must have seemed like Speed Racer did to children twenty years later.

However, as I said in my review for the first film, Freddy was never as appealing to me as the other icons, and I think it’s pretty telling that whereas I liked Dream Master OK enough then, I still preferred Dream Warriors, and now, twenty plus years later, I STILL like Dream Warriors, but don’t see myself ever wanting to watch Master again. Even if I quit HMAD (something that would appease this gentleman or lady) and thus had time to revisit films more often, I doubt Dream Master would ever entice me; if anything, I like it less and less each time I see it, so it’s in its best interest for me to ignore it from now on.

The biggest problem is obvious - Freddy was no longer scary. The opening nightmare, and even his resurrection (which I never realized doesn’t make any fucking sense - the idea is that Kristen’s belief in him being alive actually made it so - but why would he return in Kincaid’s dream, when Kincaid DIDN’T believe he could return?) has some minor tension and scariness, but it’s all thrown out the window soon after that, as the new, largely boring lot of kids take over from the original Dream Warriors and Freddy begins wisecracking like Fletch, often tossing out 2-3 zingers in a row without doing anything evil/scary. Christ, I don’t even like it when Fletch does it (like when he enters Stanwyck’s garage - “Must have cost you hundreds. That’s a good idea, I should frame mine. Pope be in later?” - shut up and move the plot along!), I sure as hell don’t appreciate a once-scary (and interesting) monster doing it.

But it’s got more problems than Freddy’s new career path. The re-casting of Kristen is particularly troublesome (like in the opening scene, where she has to awkwardly say her own name in order for us to know it’s supposed to be the same character), especially when she is “shockingly” killed at the end of act 1. With a new actress in the role, we aren’t given enough time to give a shit about her, making her death as “eh” as any of the other new folks. Kincaid and Joey don’t fare much better - not only are their death scenes quick and largely unimaginative, but their roles are diminished even before that point. You’d have to be a complete goon (or, fine, an 8 year old) to believe that the Dream Warriors were important to the film, because even before they are killed we are spending more time with Alice. Christ, we see her house/family before Kristen’s! And learn about Debbie's crush on Dan, and Sheila’s bookishness, and Rick’s karate... I appreciate that they wanted to have a connection to the previous film to lead us into this one, but it should have just been Kristen (and maybe Dr. Gordon - where is he?), which would allow the film to spend more time with her (and still introduce the new characters), and maybe give the audience a chance to care about the new actress before she was dispatched (it doesn’t help that Tuesday Knight is a pretty lousy actress anyway).

It also makes the same mistake that Freddy's Revenge did, with not really drawing the line between the real world and the dream world. But at least in part 2 it was part of the plot - Freddy wanted to get free and become “real”. Here, however, Freddy doesn’t really have an actual goal this time around (in fact once he kills Kristen he doesn’t even need to kill anyone anymore - his revenge on the Elm St parents is complete), and there is no “pull him out of the dream” or any of that other stuff, so all of the "world-breakers” are left completely unexplained and pointless. At one point Alice wakes up and sees that Freddy has left a photo on her mirror - huh? And it also fails to develop the Freddy mythology, something EVERY OTHER SEQUEL did. Dream Warriors introduced the “son of a hundred maniacs” thing, Dream Child further explained his mother’s plight and what his birth was like, and Freddy's Dead had flashbacks to his father abusing him and stuff like that. Dream Master has Freddy wearing sunglasses and eating a pizza.

Hell even if you take the dream world out of it the movie doesn’t make a lot of sense. I love that all of his victims are buried together in the same cemetery, with Nancy and Donald Thompson’s graves sitting just behind the ones for Kincaid and Joey. And how can teenagers STILL be disbelieving in the idea of Freddy after so many folks have died? One even comments that Springwood isn’t a good place to be a teenager, yet the concept of Freddy still seems to be unknown to everyone. Also - how many close friends/family members of Alice need to die before the girl takes a few days off from school?

It also fails as an R rated horror movie (maybe if it got the PG-13 that it would probably get today (save for the boob shots) my mom would have taken me after all!). Apart from some red water during Joey’s death, there isn’t a single drop of blood in the entire film, and the kills all seem trimmed (Kincaid’s to the point of confusion - he yells “KRUEGER’S BACK!” without Freddy there, and then Freddy is next to him, bloodlessly stabbing him). I’m sure the MPAA had something to do with this, but I’ve never heard of there being a problem with them on this film, and the MPAA is traditionally more lenient toward horror films that skew toward the comedic side. And Halloween 4 came out just a month or so later and that had plenty of gore (thumb to the forehead!).

So is anything good about it? Well, it’s watchable, that’s for sure. Even though the kills suck, there are plenty of them (six by my count, plus Freddy’s gonzo demise and Dan’s major injury), and the film never slows down for more than a minute or two before someone falls asleep again. And Alice is a pretty great heroine - the scene where she realizes she knows kung fu (with Dramarama’s “Anything, Anything” playing in the background - yes!) is still a crowd-pleasing delight, as is her later scene where she takes on the identity of all her dead friends before battling Freddy (I guess she can only wear those things in her dream if she has them on in real life?). And Renny Harlin stages some great fantasy/dream scenes, such as when Alice is sucked into a movie screen.

And this shouldn’t be something to praise, but I liked that it was consistent visually with the other films. They were all shot in Los Angeles, and the house always looked the same. Crystal Lake never looked the same from film to film, and while Halloween 4-6 were all shot in the same town, the series as a whole never had any consistency for the Myers house, which figured into many of the films. It’s nice that even though the writers and producers were running their character to the ground, the production designer was giving it his all.

Speaking of the writer, half of the story and half of the screenplay credit is given to LA Confidential writer Brian Helgeland, continuing and ending the tradition of Nightmare sequels being written by future Oscar nominees (after Shawshank’s Frank Darabont wrote 3). Oddly, he isn’t mentioned in any of the articles in Fangoria about the film’s production, and the writers THEY do credit (Jim and Ken Wheat) use the name Scott Pierce on the film (original writer William Kotzwinkle isn’t mentioned in Fango’s pieces either), so maybe this movie just never had a chance for real creativity or coherency with so many folks in charge of its basic structure. And of course, it goes without saying that the more or less universally agreed “good” Nightmare movies - 1, 3, and 7 - all had scripts (or at least stories) by Wes Craven, who had no involvement whatsoever in this film, unless you count the horrible “Crave Inn” gag.

Like Halloween 5 (which also killed off its supposed heroine in the first act!), Nightmare 4 has some decent scenes, and has high production value not afforded its predecessors, but had the misfortune of following up an above average (best?) sequel, and more importantly, began what would be its series’ downfall. In Halloween 5’s case it was the Man in Black, but at least he’s a relatively minor aspect of what is otherwise a decent followup. My problems with Nightmare 4, however, are threaded throughout the entire film - a few edits couldn’t have saved this one, it’s simply made with all the wrong intentions in mind. And the next two sequels fare no better, by my recollection (I haven’t watched either of them since 1999 either), because this one is at least largely coherent (unlike 5) and connected to the other films (unlike 6). So it’s either the worst of the best Freddy movies, or the best of the worst. Neither is a ringing endorsement.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

Non Canon Review: A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)

MARCH 24, 2010

GENRE: SLASHER, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)
LAST SEEN: 2004 (?)

With the “looks rather half-assed” remake coming up, I figured I’d take a look back at the original Nightmare On Elm St (and it’s sequels, not counting 2 and 3 which have already been reviewed here - look for one a week leading up to the remake’s release!), which I hadn’t seen in years. In fact, I would guess I’ve probably only seen the film maybe 5-6 times in my life. I’ve seen Dream Warriors probably 20 times, because it was my favorite as a kid (and probably still is), but otherwise, I was never as big on Freddy as I was the other horror icons.

I have no reasonable explanation for this - the films are, if nothing else, better made than any Friday the 13th movie, and it also has the suburban flair that drew me to the Halloween movies. But also, the films that came out around the time I started getting into horror (the late 80s) are also the ones that moved further away from horror and into comedy - I knew wisecracking Freddy first, and then discovered his darker version (in this film, and part 2, a slightly lesser extent) later. So basically, I was robbed of a proper introduction to the character, and by the time I finally got around to seeing the original (which, I think was the LAST one I saw of the original 5 films), I had already sort of gotten tired of him. It is the biggest irony that Freddy was always the least likely horror villain to give me nightmares - to this day I don’t think I’ve had one (Jason has chased me several times, however).

Now, of course, I realize how great of a film it is. In fact, it just dawned on me for the first time that Tina is actually sort of set up as the heroine of the film, only to be killed at the end of the first reel (another downside of watching the films out of order, though the film’s final poster “spoiled” this too). Nancy is introduced as the friend and only really takes center after Tina is dispatched. It must have been a great shock back in the day, but now it still works as evidence of how fast paced this movie is. In fact, despite the rather compact cast of kids (only 4, as opposed to the usual eight to ten-ish that the Friday films had offered), it moves along faster than most other slashers of the era, and it’s far more creative than the others to boot.

I also enjoy, and always have, how Craven depicts dreams in a fairly realistic way. People change into other people, locations change on a whim, there’s an odd sense of logic in that you can follow what is happening but actually describing it wouldn’t make a lick of sense... the sequels got away from this idea, staging big set pieces that were obviously written before the actual story of the film was. Here, the nightmares are organic to the story start to finish. Sure, it may not be as visually exciting as parts 4 or 5, but it’s more grounded in reality, and thus, far more interesting/scary - Freddy jumping up behind Tina at the beginning still gives me a bit of a jolt.

Less successful (in retrospect) is the standard Craven scene of a character setting booby traps. Not sure why he always goes back to this well, but at least five of his films have such devices, and it’s somewhat laughable. Are all of his heroes natural survivalists? I’ve said in the past that unlike Carpenter, Craven doesn’t have a particular visual style that would instantly identify one of his films to a viewer, but I guess if you see the film’s hero setting up tripwires and small shocking devices, you are probably watching a Wes Craven film. Or Home Alone.

Another thing I noticed this time around that I never gave much thought to before - why doesn’t the doctor at the Katja Institute (played by Charles “Roger Rabbit” Fleischer) ever follow through with his research? His subject breaks all of his known nightmare threshold levels, and then pulls a goddamn HAT out of her dream, but it seems he doesn’t consider this any sort of breakthrough. It’s a shame Craven was left out of the sequels for the most part, as I think he would have returned to this character in some way.

The effects still hold up quite well. The effects in the jail cell (first phasing through the bars, and then the magic blanket/noose) still impress, and the revolving bedroom is still a wonderful invention that, again, remains a remarkable visual. And the scene where Freddy attempts to break through the wall above Nancy’s bed is still chilling - and even moreso in the wake of the laughably bad CG version seen in the trailer for the remake.

And with that - the remake rant. Most notable about the original is that it’s not even that dated. Apart from the mom smoking in a hospital, there really isn’t anything in the movie that a new audience couldn’t identify with. Johnny Depp listens to a record while he watches a TV that is so small he can move it around his room with ease - will changing this to an iPod and a 27 inch LCD really make any fucking difference? I really don’t want to go down this road again, but I guess it bears repeating - Rob Zombie is a guy with a vision. It’s one I don’t always agree with, but he brings something to the table, creatively and technically. So the idea of him doing a remake of a perfect movie like Halloween is, in theory, a solid one, if remakes must exist. Friday the 13th, on the other hand, is NOT a perfect movie. It’s got a cheat ending, and it’s sort of an anomaly due to the franchise taking on a different life once Jason was introduced. Therefore, it made sense to redo Friday the 13th - it could give him a rebirth that was worthy of his iconic stature. But the Platinum Dunes factory cannot possibly improve on Nightmare on Elm St with the way they make films (combining scripts from multiple writers, hiring a director who producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form can push around, etc). The only way a new Nightmare could be a viable prospect is if a filmmaker with an actual vision AND IDEA wanted to do one. Now, I haven’t seen the film, and for all I know it’s entertaining. But it won’t change the fact that all of their money and efforts should have been utilized elsewhere, because this Nightmare still works splendidly, as both a horror film AND as an important piece in the career of its sole creator: Wes Craven (who wasn’t even given a courtesy call when the Dunes put their remake into production, let alone involved in any way as he was with the Hills Have Eyes and Last House remakes, both of which are “upper level” remakes).

/End rant.

While I still have the old boxed set from 1999 (at the time, the most money I had ever spent on a single thing besides my car; I can now get it for less than the cost of a new Blu-ray), I recently picked up the new-ish (2006?) Infinifilm release, which has a new commentary track and some other bonus features, all of which are worth a look. First is a look at the history of New Line (aka “The House That Freddy Built”), which is an unusual feature to have on any movie, let alone a horror movie (let’s see Dimension put something together like this for the inevitable Scream Blu-ray). It’s a slightly bittersweet piece, as New Line has been since folded into Warner Bros., but it’s still a nice tribute to a studio that really did take chances on genre fare (Se7en was rejected by every other studio due to the ending - New Line gave them enough to hire Brad Pitt to star in the damn thing). Then there’s a brief look at the history of dream studies, with some professors (one of whom seems to be a bigger Freddy nerd than anyone I know, despite the fact that he looks about 70) and Craven offering insight into the subject. Then there’s a 45 minute “making of” that’s really a retrospective, featuring many of the participants (no Johnny Depp, sadly) as they walk us through the entire film’s production. Actual behind the scenes footage is rather scarce; it’s mostly limited to stills - but there are some alternate takes where Englund is using his own voice for Freddy, which is kind of creepy in and of itself. The sequels aren’t really mentioned, oddly enough - surely Craven and Heather Langenkamp could have offered a thought or two on the ones they were involved with (as for Englund, the man can talk for twenty minutes straight about his shoelaces, so if asked for his perspective on the sequels, it could yield enough for an entire full length documentary).

The two commentaries are packed with info. The one with Craven, Langenkamp, Saxon, and DP Jacques Haitkin is held over from the laserdisc (apparently Haitkin’s kids have been bugging him to get one - wonder if he ever did?), but it’s screen specific, and has an equal balance of technical and creative stuff, as well as between anecdotal and insight. And Craven mentions Shocker once or twice, so that’s a plus (the track cuts out in mid-sentence though - weird). The other one is edited together from interviews with the above as well as Englund, Bob Shaye, Amanda Wyss, etc; some info is repeated, but the comments from the folks who aren’t on the other track are certainly welcome. Both are recommended.

Dream Warriors is still my favorite of the series, but the original runs a very close second, and it’s actually held up even better than Warriors has (those skeleton effects in the graveyard NEVER looked good). And I’m kind of glad I never really watched it a lot, as it allows me to look at it more or less with a fresh pair of eyes, without nostalgia clouding my judgment as it probably does for other childhood horror movies (again, Shocker, plus some of the Friday and Child’s Play sequels). And with this new viewing, I remain more convinced than ever that the upcoming remake is as unnecessary as they come.

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...