A Nightmare On Elm Street

Viewer Rating:simonconnolly has rated A Nightmare On Elm Street rating: 2 Star

Wes Cravens 1984 film Nightmare on Elm Street was, and still is a horror masterpiece. Freddy Krueger, the blade fingered, stripy jumpered villain was for lack of a better word utterly terrifying. But since his big debut there have been numerous sequels, which only succeeded in diluting the originals creepiness. And so what do they do to save the franchise. Just leave it alone perhaps. Of course not, it is Hollywood after all. No point leaving it when they can just as easily do a remake. And that is exactly what they've done. And to make matters worse cinema enemy #1 Michael Bay and his production company, who specialise in ruining classic horror films and shaming their name with inferior re-imaginings. are in control here. Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Friday the 13th have already become victims to them and now its this. So is is third time lucky for Bay and his production company. Not quite, but they're certainly getting there.

The film tells the story of a group of teenagers who are terrorised by a mysterious killer who haunts their dreams, but what happens to them in their dreams also happens to them in the real world. Luckily they have not made a carbon copy of the original (Gus Van Sant's Psycho) but thats not to say that they made it very original. With the films terrifying premise the films work is almost done for it but director Bayer never really succeeded in capturing the right mood and getting that atmosphere to set the scene. He fills it with the big mistakes horror films always seem to make these days. The first are those cheap thrills, the ones you get when something unexpected happens, and is gone moments later. For me these have always just been things incorporated by horror directors to hide the fact that they cannot actually make horror films. And the film also does that incredibly irritating thing of building things up, getting some great tension going and then at the end have nothing happen. These are the slight annoyances which have made it impossible to enjoy horror films in recent years.

The one thing that I thought was done poorly, and which really should've been better was the dream sequences. For most of the film you have no idea whether you're watching a dream or reality as they are entered out of nowhere. And as the film progresses they become far too frequent to remain creepy throughout as you begin to know what to expect, and this takes some of the punch out of the big finale. Not to mention the fact that we aren't left in the real world long enough and so Kruegers back story, despite most people probably already knowing it, is crammed into a few minutes of the reality scenes, and even seeps into some of the dream bits. That being said they looked beautiful. The opening sequence instantly raised my expectation for the film as it was truly stunning. It was beautifully captured, atmospheric and genuinely creepy. Unfortunately it was the best of the film and so I just got more and more disappointed. The ending battle wasn't bad though. In a year of highly anticipated films with bitterly underwhelming endings (Alice In Wonderland, Iron Man 2) the final battle in this film was refreshingly exciting and satisfying.

The hands down worst thing about this whole thing was the last moments of the film which leave it open for a sequel. It had wrapped itself up perfectly and the it went and made the last 20 minutes of the film completely useless but just bringing Freddy back from the dead. again. So now there is going to be a sequel, exactly the thing which killed this franchise in the first place.

The big question I had going in was how Jackie Earle Haley would get on stepping into the creepy shoes once worn by Robert Englund. Despite the make up making him look more like Sloth from The Goonies I think he did quite a good job. He was entirely convincing as psychopath Krueger. His back story, despite being poorly presented is interesting and engaging. Sure he had his fair share of terrible lines "hows this for a wet dream" which made him less freaky, but he saved it with the rest of his display and his just generally scary presence. The rest of the cast, blending the old and the new with emo kids and of course the horror films favourite victims; the beautiful people, are as spilt in talent as they are in looks. And it was actually a rather clean divide as I can safely say that all the emo actors are dull and outright dreadful whereas the more conventional, beautiful people are relatively strong performers.

So all in all Nightmare on Elm Street is an entertaining but ultimately inferior remake. It has absolutely nothing on the original and the worst thing is it seems to think it does and so I would recommend you revisit the original instead. But if you feel compelled to go see this then you can at least enjoy the beautiful visuals, the strong lead performance, the cheap thrills and one of the first horror film in years not too overdo the gore.

Review published on the 13 May 2010 23:39