Written by Scott Edwards & John Edward Betancourt‘Did you know that after the heart stops beating, the brain can function for well over seven minutes? We've got six more minutes to play.’
Scott's Review:
Being able to forget something bad that happened to you as a child is one thing that many people try to do to move forward. While some people believe in forgetting, I am a firm believer that the things that happened to you, be them good or bad helped to shape you into the person you are today. By learning how not to make the same mistake twice or steering clear of similar traumatic situations, you become a stronger person with a story to tell that nobody can take away from you. It can be difficult to know what to do with your past knowledge, but once you do, you will feel better for not letting it go and continuing to live life the way you want. Working at the local diner, Nancy sees a couple of her classmates meeting up and having a good time. While keeping an eye on the table full of boys, she notices that her friend Dean is starting to doze off. Giving Dean a warning not to fall to sleep, his new girlfriend Kris arrives to see what has been keeping him up for the past couple nights. Turning her attention to the boys’ table, Nancy does not see the inner battle that has taken over Dean when he is left alone. Falling asleep and seeing the man that wants to kill him, Dean is not able to wake up from his dream and slices his own throat open without issue. Grieving for the loss of their friend, Kris nods off for a moment and sees herself as a little girl with cut marks across her chest. Waking up and talking with her friends and looking at the photos of Dean’s life, she sees something that is out of the ordinary, a photo of her and Dean as little kids. Not knowing Dean before they went to high school together, Kris wants to find out what is behind the photo and why she cannot remember it. Asking her mother what it means, she is not able to get an answer and tries to do some digging of her own. But not finding what she is looking for, her dreams are starting to take over her life, just like Dean’s and she needs a way to escape. Getting a visit from her ex-boyfriend Jesse, Kris lets her guard down and goes to sleep, only to find that the dream master is waiting for her and she will not be able to escape his clutches.
Watching as Kris is torn apart in front of him, Jesse is forced to run away from the house since he will surely be accused of her murder. Making it to Nancy’s house before the cops find him, he explains to his friend what he has seen and Nancy knows a little bit more of who was behind it, a man named Freddy. Getting rushed off to jail, Jesse has to try everything in his power to stay awake, as he is on the burn victim’s hit list. Knowing that Jesse is not crazy, Nancy decides to look for help and gives Quentin a call for advice. Finding out that Kris is dead, Quentin turns to his medication to keep him from falling asleep and finds out all kinds of facts about sleep deprivation and the effects it is going to have on himself and Nancy if they are not able to figure out what is going on.
As micro dreams start to take over Nancy’s awake time, she is starting to see things that she does not remember as a child and starts to look to that for what she cannot remember from being a child. Finding out that there was a preschool that had been shut down with an employee named Freddy Krueger, who everyone is seeing in their dreams, they look into the story a little bit deeper. Finding out that they were a part of Freddy being put to death by upset parents, the two do not remember what happened back when they were little and try to ask the dream master for forgiveness, but the monster is only concerned with satisfying his bloodlust. As the minutes turn into hours, Freddy is starting to gain his strength once again and is ready to go for the final kill of his favorite Nancy whom his legacy will forever live through. I would like to try and call this movie a reboot, but it really is only a remake as you see some of the iconic shots from the original and scenes that are pretty darn close to what happened in the 1984 classic. With a couple things changed, it feels like the movie tried its hardest to be something new, but fell back into the complicity of what the original brought to the screen instead. I am still not sure why they changed who and what Freddy was, a child murderer is frightening enough, and trying to change up the script to say he was a molester is not any creepier, but clearly someone expected this to change the outcome of the movie. Since it did not, I am not sure really what the point of the movie was in the long run, I know that it did not excite people about the original series when looking at the reviews, since there was not really a message, much less a point to it. With some blood, normal jump scares, plenty of knife play, creepy pictures and a shorter Freddy, it may be a good time killer if you have it, but I will have several sleepless nights going forward trying to understand why this movie ever hit the big screen. Stay Scared.
John's Review:
So, it came to pass after so many years of terrorizing teens on the big screen that the legend that was Freddy Krueger finally seemed to fade from our memories after Robert Englund's final appearance as the character in the action-packed motion picture, Freddy vs. Jason. But you simply cannot keep one of film's biggest icons down and in 2010, the day finally came when the original tale that captivated the imagination of so many, was reimagined in a remake. It was time for a new Freddy, a new take on the tale and I think it goes without saying that every single horror fan out there raised an eyebrow with curiosity at the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street. The plot of the film matches the original pretty darn closely, so there's no need to discuss any of that. No instead it's time to talk about the fact that this was a polarizing remake for several reasons revolving around the legendary Freddy. Of course, the first question on everyone's mind when it comes to this is film...is whether or not it is worth seeing and the answer to that question is yes, because this is a film that has its moments, courtesy of Jackie Earle Haley's performance of the iconic Freddy Krueger.
He brings a menacing and cold nature to the role that was never quite present in the Englund era, one that shows a man dedicated to revenge. In fact, Haley's Krueger truly enjoys taking his time to torture and kill and it makes for some disturbing and chilling moments that definitely hold a candle to the original franchise. Yet at the same time, Freddy's story is also the film's greatest flaw.
What made Freddy so incredible in the original films, was the fact that he was an unstoppable force in both life and death. He was truly a monster. Murder and bloodlust were his oxygen and his need to satisfy this made him a terrifying monster. There was really no rhyme or reason for why at his core he wanted to slash kids, we only knew of his reasons for vengeance when we are first introduced to the character. In this film, there is some humanizing of Freddy, and while his backstory is still disturbing to say the least, this humanizing and centralizing of his vendetta somehow takes away from the monster. He only seems focused on the Elm Street children and is no longer the sadistic psychopath who wants his weight in blood. Those two elements make for a watchable film, one that definitely unsettles you on many levels, yet at the same time, it doesn't quite feel as satisfying as any of the other films simply because of how vastly different it looks and feels. If anything, it does one big thing for the franchise, it introduces Freddy to a new generation, keeping the tale alive. But if by chance you haven't seen this movie yet, at least give a look because of Jackie's performance as Krueger and simply out of respect because hey...it's a Freddy Krueger movie and that alone is worth it.
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