A Nightmare on Elm Street Series Wrap Up

Holy moly, that was a lot to get through.  But we’re not done yet!  There are a few items I wanted to mention before we move out of Elm Street.

Similar to the Alien series the Nightmare pictures were a launching pad for hot young directors.  Wes Craven had already been around a little while and made a splash with The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes.  He also just finished up the slightly higher profile offbeat camp-fest Swamp Thing.  Nightmare was the one that made him a superstar though.  And of course in the 90’s he crafted another gigantic hit with Scream.

Part 2 was helmed by Jack Sholder who didn’t become a mega director but he did follow up with several really fun pictures including the sci-fi Terminator-esque The Hidden and the action bonanza Renegades.

Chuck Russell did part 3 and went on to have a colorful career working on effects heavy projects such as the 1988 Blob, The Mask and the underrated Schwarzenegger classic Eraser.

Part 4 saw the rise of Renny Harlin who’s a personal favorite of mine.  He would eventually deliver the amped up shark adventure Deep Blue Sea, the comic book-y ultra cool ”Bourne Identity” (books) knock off The Long Kiss Goodnight and perhaps the most pirate-y movie ever made with Cutthroat Island.

Stephen Hopkins came on for part 5 and continued to do good work on Blown Away and some incredible work on Predator 2.

Series producer Rachel Talalay slid into the director’s chair for Freddy’s Dead and then put together an array of quirky films afterwards that include Tank Girl and Ghost in the Machine.  She moved over to be a prominent TV director working on everything from Ally McBeal to The Flash.

Ronny Yu cut his teeth in the Hong Kong cinema game in the 80’s and 90’s.  He didn’t do much after Freddy vs. Jason but he did make one of his best known films, Fearless with Jet Li.

Samuel Bayer was a long time commercial and music video director before doing the Nightmare remake.  After the hostile response to the film he went back to music videos.  His resume in that area though is unparalleled.  Some of the folks he’s worked with include Nirvana, The Ramones, Iron Maiden, Rush, David Bowie, Metallica, Sheryl Crow, Aerosmith, Green Day, The Strokes, Maroon 5 and Papa Roach.  Jesus.

Similarly the writers utilized to help build out the universe of the franchise is equally impressive.  Here’s a sampling: Wes Craven (you know), Frank Darabont (The Green Mile, The Walking Dead), Brian Helgeland (Payback, LA Confidential), Leslie Bohem (Dante’s Peak, Daylight), Michael De Luca (much more of a producer but he wrote In the Mouth of Madness and a bunch of episodes of Freddy’s Nightmares (don’t worry we’ll get there)), Wesley Strick (Arachnophobia, Cape Fear (1991)) and Eric Heisserer (Arrival, Bird Box).

And of course jaw dropping special effects have been a mainstay of the series from the very start.  The two biggest shoutouts in this department go to David Miller (The Terminator, Tales from the Crypt, Friday the 13^th: A New Beginning) who made Freddy Krueger a reality through his brilliant makeup work on the first film (fun fact: melted cheese on a pizza was his inspiration for Krueger’s scorched flesh) and then Kevin Yagher (Child’s Play, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, Face/Off) who did an amazing job carrying the torch for most of the sequels.

This isn’t to discount everyone else in the other areas of production.  All the people who worked on these pictures did a wonderful job.  The series has a cohesion that carries through yet each picture offers a distinct feel.  It can’t be overstated that the technical work has been an inspiration for countless other filmmakers.

And then there’s the man himself, Robert Englund.  He’s arguably the heart and soul of this whole thing.  Freddy wouldn’t be the same if someone else had been cast.  Englund has a lot of thoughts on playing the character but here are some of the more noteworthy tidbits. He says there’s a dance to Krueger’s movements, how he turns and handles himself.  Once this is pointed out it’s easy to pick up on.  Sometimes he’s graceful and sometimes he lunges out of nowhere but there’s always a flair to it. 

Englund also talks about the knife glove having a weight to it (mainly in the first two movies (the original glove was stolen during the shooting of part 3 by someone working on Evil Dead II where you can see it hanging in the cabin’s shed)).  This causes Freddy to drop his right shoulder and give him an almost gunslinger posture.  Badass.

Obviously not everything was in Englund’s control like the crazy effects, the script and the final decisions made by the editor and director.  But he certainly wasn’t afraid to put his own spin on the character like when he brandishes his knives with the line “this is God” or the tongue wagging at his female victims or the infamous “welcome to prime time bitch!”  It’s a unique spontaneous combination of elements that makes Freddy Freddy.

The evolution from Fred to Freddy is another interesting aspect.  In the first two installments he’s Fred and doesn’t joke around a lot.  But in the third one he’s now more informally Freddy and he ain’t scared to crack some witticisms your way.  By the time we get to Freddy’s Dead he’s a straight up cartoon character.  It makes sense to get serious after that with New Nightmare but in Freddy vs. Jason I think they got the balance perfect.  For the remake they sadly made him so no nonsense he’s kinda boring.

Now how about a couple of bests and worsts?

The best deaths are the roach motel in Dream Master and Tina being dragged around the room in the first film.  One is wacky nuts while the other is gets under my skin nuts.

The worst death is the invisible martial arts fight which ironically is also in Dream Master.  That just feels like what it actually is, they ran out of money and still had more filming to do.  Honorable mention is the comic book death from Dream Child.  It’s not creepy in the slightest and slashing a paper cutout of the victim doesn’t make for riveting imagery.

The best film is the original hands down.  It’s the most well rounded.

The worst is the remake.  Nothing thrilling going on there.  In the series proper I’m gonna say Freddy’s Dead.  Even though it was intentionally lighter in tone and is legitimately funny at times it deviates too far from where I would like Freddy and the story to be.

For further viewing you can check out Freddy’s Nightmares which was a horror anthology TV show hosted by Freddy Krueger released in conjunction with part 4.  Englund reprises his role and makes cheesy puns during cutscenes in between an episode’s story.  It’s totally a Tales from the Crypt rip off except it came out a year before in 1988.  I’ve only seen the two episodes that come with the blu ray bundle of the films and it’s fine I guess.  Not as good as Tales.  I can’t imagine they had quite the same budget behind it but they did attract some extraordinary talent to write and direct a few episodes including Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Poltergeist) and Dwight H. Little (Halloween 4, Marked for Death, Rapid Fire).

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Real Nightmares was a reality show from 2005 where people would confront their real life fears and it was hosted by Robert Englund as Freddy.  Episodes were shot but it never aired.  Probably because it was clearly a Fear Factor copycat.

And finally there are some documentaries.  Never Sleep Again goes through the making of each film and is nicely done with a lot of info.  I’d recommend that one if you want to dig deeper into the thought process behind the movies.  Just be aware it’s a bit lengthy at four hours long.

Scream, Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street is Mark Patton’s doc half about his life and half about his experience on Freddy’s Revenge and how society’s treatment towards gay people has impacted him.  In the scope of the Nightmare universe it’s a very specific topic to spend a lot of time on so you would need to decide if that’s something you’d like to delve into.  Patton examines the history of horror in gay culture and explores the Venn diagram of where horror films and the gay community converge.  While Patton has an agenda (mainly looking for closure on how he felt vilified by Freddy’s Revenge writer David Chaskin) I thought it was a pretty good watch that illuminated me to this particular cross section of fandom.

Also I Am Nancy is Heather Langenkamp’s doc on her exploration of the character Nancy Thompson.  Haven’t seen this one so I can’t comment.

Ooookay, those are the Nightmares on Elm Street.  Definitely an entertaining series that encompasses so much creativity and great filmmaking.  I recommend checking out all the movies (except the 2010 remake) if you’ve only made it to certain ones over the years.  Hell, three are under ninety mins and the rest barely get over that threshold (apart from New Nightmare which runs longer).  They’re easy watches but at the same time there’s a lot to analyze like the recurring use of red and green lighting, stripes in the set design and did you realize it took Freddy four damn films to finally pick off all the Elm Street kids?  Sweet dreams, bitch!