A Nightmare on Elmstreet

[David Desio]

At the risk of losing any credibility(not that I have ever claimed to be credible) I have to say that I grew up on the Nightmare series. Freddy Kruger was my super hero; hell I even had a Freddy Kruger birthday cake for my 8th birthday (the nice old cake lady at publix did a fine job decorating it). So when I heard that they were going to remake the story that I held so dear, I was very skeptical.

 

Then I went to see it on opening night, filing in among the ranks of all the under age teens who snuck in from other theatres, giggling nervously as they scurried to the dark back row. I'll spare plot details because we all know what happens, some kids have the same nightmare, they all die except one (well in this case 2) and...sequel?

 

So the acting was pretty weak by the kids, but its a horror flick so what should I expect, right? Freddy had a cool new and more realistic burn-victim look and I thought the cinematography was done well. All througout were traces of the colors red and green, you know like Freddy's sweater and darn it if they didn't really try to be creepy and atmospheric for the nightmare sequences. They even went so far as to put some kind of weird filter on SOME shots during the nightmare, a kinda halating vingette if that makes sense. It looked like a post effect thrown on at the last minute becuse the director thought "crap, what if the audience doesn't get that this is supposed to be a dream? Mr. Editor, sir, what kind of plug-ins do you have in your editing program?"

 

Overall I had a good time, it's been a while since I saw a horror film in the theatre that I was excited about. They didn't break any new ground with this one but hey, I hear next time around it'll be in 3-D.

 

Spent

[Elliot Rudmann]

They even went so far as to put some kind of weird filter on SOME shots during the nightmare, a kinda halating vingette if that makes sense. It looked like a post effect thrown on at the last minute becuse the director thought "crap, what if the audience doesn't get that this is supposed to be a dream? Mr. Editor, sir, what kind of plug-ins do you have in your editing program?"

 

That might have been the Panavision hylen system they used on set: http://www.hylensystem.com/

[David Desio]

ahh, I see. Interesting. I guess I should have done some research first. Still didn't like the look it created though.

[Guest]

I just love it when these movies open at number one at the box office. Over and above the rantings and ravings of the critics that hate these movies.

 

R,

[David Desio]

I'm a horror fan first and love reading what the critics say. It's almost like they forget that these are horror films and can't be measured the same way as a serious piee of cinema. We watch these films to see a cool monster/madman/ghost or creature destroy some really dumb teenagers...good old fashion slasher movies.

[Scott Bullock]

I don't think that horror films and "serious cinema," are, or are necessarily, mutually exclusive. There are horror films out there with just as much, or more, subtext and meaning than movies that are considered "serious."

 

But, this is another remake from Michael Bay, so it probably is much more superficial than the original was. Bay has shown time and again that, when it comes to remaking these classic horror films, subtext and deeper meaning have no value, that story barely matters, and that *all* that matters is making money. Okay, sure, this is a business and people go into business to make money, but there are a lot of horror fans out there (myself included) that despise Michael Bay for butchering so many classic horror films.