You mentioned the Home Alone-type booby traps Nancy sets up, but this was actually lifted from The Last House on the Left, right down to the lightbulb filled with gunpowder trick. I saw "Last House" many years after I saw the first Nightmare on Elm Street, but recognized it right away.
And the main bad guy's name was Krug. I think Craven was just trying to see if anyone else noticed, or hoping they didn't.
::Craven maintains an eerie atmosphere throughout, so we never quite know when we’re in dreamland or the real world. ::
That's what I really loved about the first two movies was the weird "dream logic" of their world, where the everyday could suddenly turn supernatural and menacing. By THE DREAM WARRIORS the dividing line between reality and the Dreamworld felt a lot more obvious and leaden....
::Don’t believe me? Why not watch Jackie Earle Haley humiliate himself in the godawful reboot? Better yet, don’t. ::
I think the problem was Jackie Earle Haley played Freddy like maybe he *wasn't* the defiler of children originally, which makes what happens to him at the start of the movie feel more like a pulp version of Arthur Miller's THE CRUCIBLE than the start of a horror franchise. Wes Craven made both Freddie and what the parents did to him monstrous—hate feeding off hate resulting in the immortal creature who inhabits teenagers' dreams and kills them. (Gee, why does this sound a lot like current events?)
Seeing Haley's Freddie being chased, cornered, and burned to a crisp by the mob puts the audience more on his side than the Elm Street parents and their children's. Yes, you can certainly have sympathetic villains and even monsters, but I don't think Freddy Krueger's persona can work that way....
"Craven maintains an eerie atmosphere throughout, so we never quite know when we’re in dreamland or the real world. Craven and cinematographer Jacques Haitkin tip their hand by giving the dream sequences the same diffused lighting. "
Yes! That's part of what makes this movie so scary and disturbing...you never quite know if it is a dream or reality.
I'm not sure its fair to say Nancy defeats Kruger just by turning her back on him, although that does happen in the movie. She makes a speech about how her fear is giving him his power and by turning her back on him, drops her fear. That defeats Kruger. She is no longer afraid of him, so he has no power over her.
You mentioned the Home Alone-type booby traps Nancy sets up, but this was actually lifted from The Last House on the Left, right down to the lightbulb filled with gunpowder trick. I saw "Last House" many years after I saw the first Nightmare on Elm Street, but recognized it right away.
And the main bad guy's name was Krug. I think Craven was just trying to see if anyone else noticed, or hoping they didn't.
::Craven maintains an eerie atmosphere throughout, so we never quite know when we’re in dreamland or the real world. ::
That's what I really loved about the first two movies was the weird "dream logic" of their world, where the everyday could suddenly turn supernatural and menacing. By THE DREAM WARRIORS the dividing line between reality and the Dreamworld felt a lot more obvious and leaden....
::Don’t believe me? Why not watch Jackie Earle Haley humiliate himself in the godawful reboot? Better yet, don’t. ::
I think the problem was Jackie Earle Haley played Freddy like maybe he *wasn't* the defiler of children originally, which makes what happens to him at the start of the movie feel more like a pulp version of Arthur Miller's THE CRUCIBLE than the start of a horror franchise. Wes Craven made both Freddie and what the parents did to him monstrous—hate feeding off hate resulting in the immortal creature who inhabits teenagers' dreams and kills them. (Gee, why does this sound a lot like current events?)
Seeing Haley's Freddie being chased, cornered, and burned to a crisp by the mob puts the audience more on his side than the Elm Street parents and their children's. Yes, you can certainly have sympathetic villains and even monsters, but I don't think Freddy Krueger's persona can work that way....
"Craven maintains an eerie atmosphere throughout, so we never quite know when we’re in dreamland or the real world. Craven and cinematographer Jacques Haitkin tip their hand by giving the dream sequences the same diffused lighting. "
Yes! That's part of what makes this movie so scary and disturbing...you never quite know if it is a dream or reality.
I'm not sure its fair to say Nancy defeats Kruger just by turning her back on him, although that does happen in the movie. She makes a speech about how her fear is giving him his power and by turning her back on him, drops her fear. That defeats Kruger. She is no longer afraid of him, so he has no power over her.
Out of my own curiosity, I would like someone to let me know if the "Wishmaster" franchise has any worthwhile sequels.
Fromtheyardtothearthouse.substack.com