A Nightmare on Elm Street

Summary

“One…two…Freddy’s coming for you.”

Horror film director Wes Craven was both a provocateur and a pioneer. His films Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes were some of the most extreme horror films of the Seventies and they spawned a million imitators. Wes Craven came from exploitation, and he knew how to sink the razors of fear and unease into his audience. A few years after directing the comic book film Swamp Thing, Wes Craven was ready to go back to his roots. He wanted to release something truly horrifying for the populace. A Nightmare on Elm Street was anything but a mainstream film at the time that it was made. There had been some very effective and frightening films that had come before such as Jaws, The Shining, Psycho, Rosemary’’s Baby and The Exorcist to name a few. The Friday the 13th series and its hockey-mask wearing Jason Vorrhees had spawned a million copycat slashers, but nobody had come up with an idea as effectively terrifying as what Wes Craven had in mind. Wes Craven came up with a villain and premise so effective that it would make audiences afraid to go to sleep.

Released in 1984, made on a budget of less than a couple million dollars, A Nightmare on Elm Street did more than twenty five million dollars at the box office. That was before it was released on VHS and became a staple of Halloween time viewing. The picture spawned numerous sequels and at one point it even spawned a television series called Freddy’s Nightmares. The character of Freddy Krueger is still just as popular today as he was forty years ago. I have to admit that the VHS covers of the Nightmare series were so frightening to me as a child, that I actually did not watch the movie for the first time until a couple years ago as a grown adult. I was very impressed by the picture when I finally saw it. I was pleased to see that Warner had decided to give this classic horror film a 4K UHD Release just in time for Halloween.

Spoiler Alert: If you have not watched the film before, consider skipping over the plot synopsis portion of this review. It is difficult to describe the plot without describing the first character death in the film.

As the film begins, Tina (Amanda Wyss) dreams of a horribly disfigured man stalking her. His name is Freddy Krueger, but she does not know that. Freddy wears a green and red shirt, a fedora, and he wears gloves with razor sharp claws affixed to them. In Tina’s dream, she is being pursued by this killer who can seemingly impact the dream world around her. When Tina awakens, her night shirt is slashed in the real world. Tina’s mom stumbles in drunkenly and tells her to get some rest. Tina warns her best friends Nancy (Heather Langenkamp) and Glenn (Johnny Depp) about her dream she had. That night Nancy, Tina, and Glenn are hanging out. They discover that they all had similar dreams.  Nancy dreamed of a man with a grey and green sweater scratching his finger knives on things. Tina believes it is the same man as in her dream. Bad boy Rod (Nick Corri) shows up unannounced to their gathering and proceeds to grab Tina for some sex. Glenn and Nancy hang out while Tina and Rod hook up. After having sex, Rod tells Tina that he had a nightmare the night before also. They go to bed. Tina wakes in the bedroom, but (spoiler alert) she is still in a dream. She is chased by the mutilated Freddy Krueger and he grabs onto her with his razor sharp hands. Rod wakes up and sees Tina struggling as she is being murdered by some sort of force as she sleeps. Tina is propelled to the ceiling and she is torn apart before dropping dead onto the bed. Rod screams and their friends come to the room, but the door is locked from the inside. Rod runs past Nancy and Glenn and flees from the crime scene in fear that he will be accused of her murder. Nancy’s father Lt. Thompson (John Saxon) is the sheriff. When the police arrive at the house, he asks Nancy what occurred. With Rod not there to defend himself, they assume that he had performed the vicious murder of Tina. Nancy doesn’t beleive that to be possible, but she has no way of explaining what has occurred. The next day, Nancy goes to school. Coming home from school, Rod jumps out of a bush and asks Nancy for her help. He explains that some thing killed Tina. Nancy’s father, who has kept his daughter under hidden surveillance, arrests Rod for Tina’s murder against Nancy’s wishes. Rod is taken to the station. Nancy has another close call with Freddy Krueger when she nearly falls asleep while taking a bath. Realizing the danger that sleep poses to herself and her friends, she and her friends attempt to stay awake to avoid Freddy’s wrath. They don’t realize that the town has a dark secret which has caused Freddy to seek revenge on the children of the town.

Jaws scared you from going into the water, Psycho scared you from taking your shower, Friday the 13th scared you from summer camp and the woods. The Shining scared you from large hotels. A Nightmare on Elm Street was far more insidious. The film made you afraid to go to sleep. The script by Wes Craven plays on the worst aspects of our potential dream states, and the picture is absolutely effective. The thought of an evil force that could invade our dream state, take away our control of that environment, and then cause us unbelievable pain, is a pretty imaginative and horrifying idea. The scenarios themselves are not as frightening as the actual premise, but they are still pretty damn effective. (SPOILER ALERT) The death scene for Tina is one of the most brilliant death scenes of any horror film. As a practical effect, it still holds up astonishingly well. I would argue that this sequence is one of the most frightening and disturbing of any horror films I have ever seen. There is another death later in the film that is just as effective and memorable

A Nightmare on Elm Street is a film that many consider the scariest ever made. It is hard to argue that the character of Freddy Krueger – a horribly burnt pure evil pedophile who preys on teenagers in their dreams – is one of the scariest horror villains ever created. As a child, even the cover to the VHS was enough to scare most kids and give them nightmares. When hanging out with friends, nobody ever pushes back from the idea of watching Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter with me (the best of the bunch,) or any other number of horror films, but if I bring up the idea of watching A Nightmare on Elm Street, I have had very little luck finding an audience to watch it with me. People just find it that frightening.

Wes Craven was a provocateur. He never shied away from putting whatever horrible ideas he had on screen to get a reaction from the audience from the very start of his career. I don’t think there is any debate over what he is best remembered for. The dream logic employed in A Nightmare on Elm Street would influence countless other pictures, including Hellbound: Hellraiser II and too many others to mention. The picture spawned a number of sequels in the Eighties, and in the early Nineties Wes Craven was brought back once more for a series highlight A New Nightmare. 

The performances in the film are of pretty decent quality. Some of the acting is a little bit stilted, but the dialogue is not as impressive as the scenarios, so I can understand how some of the actors may have struggled to bring much life into some of their lines. It was also a low budget affair, and the casting reflected that. The lead actress who plays Nancy, Heather Langenkamp, is not as talented an actress as some of those around her, but she is still immensely likable in the role. Johnny Depp, who at the time was best known for the television series 21 Jump Street had his breakout role in the picture. This was just the start of his meteoric rise to leading man status. John Saxon is enjoyable as the sheriff father who wants to figure out what the hell is going on in his town. The other cast members who play Tina and Rod and Nancy’s mother all do just fine in their roles, but they are all completely overshadowed by the performance of Robert Englund. Robert Englund had already starred in some other well-known horror films, including Eaten Alive, but this picture defined his entire career. To this day, kids still flock to stores around Halloween time to purchase Freddy Krueger costumes, gloves, and masks. My youngest son Dash has never seen A Nightmare on Elm Street, and neither has my oldest son for that matter, but that hasn’t stopped them from asking to purchase the Freddy Krueger mask and glove. it is a great example of when a character and an actor’s performance becomes part of the cultural zeitgeist. Robert Englund and his performance as Freddy – which he reprised eight more times onscreen and in the short lived television series Freddy’s Nightmares – is truly iconic.

The direction by Wes Craven is effective. This was a modestly budgeted affair and some of the budgetary constraints come across in some of the softer focus of the camera work. That said, the practical effects in the picture are brilliantly conceived and executed. I enjoyed the soundtrack of the film which will remind viewers of the efficacy of the voices heard in Goblin’s soundtrack for Argento’s classic film Suspiria. Whether you like A Nightmare on Elm Street or not, I think it would be almost impossible to deny how effective the picture is. Wes Craven knew exactly how to get into the mind of his audience and leave something there forever. I am thankful to Warner Bros for bringing his horror masterpiece to 4K UHD. If you’re a fan of the picture, of course you want to add this to your collection.

Video

The new 4K HEVC/H.265 transfer of A Nightmare on Elm Street from Warner Bros., is a big improvement over the dated 2010 Blu-ray release which featured a shaky VC-1 codec. A Nightmare on Elm Street has a slightly softer look, but that makes sense when you consider the film’s modest budget. The 4K UHD brings out much more detail than the Blu-ray release and the source seems to be in very good shape. The film’s color timing seems accurate to the filmmaker’s intentions. The increased resolution occasionally shows you some make up effects used to make certain characters look tired, which look more like clown make up now, but that is not a complaint so much as an observation. While the film will never look as good as pictures with much higher budgets, this 4K brings out the very best in the film. Fans of the picture should be very pleased with the results of this new 4K edition.

Audio

Warner Bros. have provided a brand new Atmos track for this release alongside a DTS-HD MA 2.0 mono track. The Atmos track is pretty fantastic. It respects the original sound design while adding a ton of immersion (which is so helpful when viewing a horror picture.) Fans of the film will be excited that all the audio has been restored for the film, which was not the case on the dated Blu-ray release. Clarity is very good and the track shows off strong surround and LFE channels support. Purists will be excited to have the Mono track to listen to as well. This is stellar work from Warner.

Supplements:

• Audio Commentary #1 (Theatrical Cut only) – A 2001 archival commentary track featuring writer/director Wes Craven, actors Heather Langenkamp and John Saxon, and cinematographer Jacques Haitki.
• Audio Commentary #2 (Theatrical Cut only) – A 2006 archival track with separate comments from writer/director Wes Craven; New Line Cinema founder Robert Shaye; actors Robert Englund, Heather Langenkamp, Amanda Wyss, and Ronee Blakley; producers Sara Risher and John Burrows; cinematographer Jacques Haitkin; composer Charles Bernstein; editors Rick Shaine and Patrick McMahon; mechanical special effects designer Jim Doyle; special makeup effects artist David B. Miller; and film historian David Del Valle.
• Focus Points – numerous short behind-the-scenes segments
• Alternate Endings 
• The House That Freddy Built: The Legacy of New Line Horror  
• Never Sleep Again: The Making of “A Nightmare on Elm Street” 
• Night Terrors: The Origins of Wes Craven’s Nightmares 

Overall Scores: 

Video – 4.25/5

Audio – 4.5/5

Supplements – 4.5/5

Overall – 4.75/5

A Nightmare on Elm Street is one of the most effective horror films ever made. Wes Craven knew how to dig deep into the psyches of his audience and leave something unforgettable behind. I would argue that A Nightmare on Elm Street is his masterpiece (even though I probably enjoy watching Scream more because of its lighter and more comedic tone.) Freddy Krueger is certainly his most iconic creation. Krueger remains one of the most recognizable (and frightening) horror villains ever conceived, and the character gave Robert Englund a long career in the iconic role. Warner Bros. has given the picture a solid 4K UHD upgrade with a good looking 4K transfer and an excellent Dolby Atmos upgrade. Fans of the film will certainly want to add this title to their collection. A Nightmare on Elm Street on 4K will definitely be a dream come true for horror film collectors. Highly recommended!