Review of A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) by Steve R — 26 Dec 2012

A very entertaining and intense film of dreams and horror. What it lacks in humor, it makes up for in sheer fright. It was a game changer of the horror genre at the time, with John Carpenter's 1978 slasher Halloween taking the title of the Godfather of horror films.

Well, Craven changed all that with one single film. This 1984 scarefest will be a nightmare to get over with, no pun intended, but I suppose my words should be appropriate because of the title. I remember being afraid to sleep for a week after watching this.

Robert Englund made for an impressive villian in his now legendary performance of Freddy Krueger. While I prefer Wes Craven's notorious thriller/slasher series known as Scream, I still look back fondly on this film as it was the first horror film I ever viewed.

Unfortunately, despite all its benefits and good points, I found the first sequel very enjoyable. Not nearly as scary,mind you, but more enjoyable from a film standpoint. In terms of sheer horror and delightful frights? Elm Street takes the win but in terms of plain simple enjoyment? Elm Street II: Freddy's Revenge is my movie.

Does this mean I prefer the second one over the original? Ha-ell-no. The second one is actually really awful. The storyline is bleak and uninteresting and the film eventually runs a bit long. But then so does the first one but it was much more easy to stay caught up in.

I just think II had more superior entertaining skills as far as characters go. Either way, A Nightmare on Elm Street is an extremely spooky film about what dreams can do if they were reality.