A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
The Gist
Freddy & the Rest: Robert Englund (Fred Krueger); Heather Langenkamp (Nancy Thompson); Johnny Depp (Glen); John Saxon (Lt. Donald Thompson); Amanda Wyss (Tina); Jsu Garcia (Rod)
My Take: Nancy and friends fight the evils of sleep as dead child murderer Freddy stalks their dreams. This has to be one of my favourite horror movies. I watched it again last week and the dated ’80’s hair and clothes didn’t even bother me. What did bother me was Freddy because he’s creepy! There are several scenes in this flick that are just disturbing in their simplicity. The lamb (or is it a goat) crying when Tina is in the boiler room is unnerving for some reason. When Tina is in the alley and Freddy is stalking her, everything about that scene is scary.
Another great sequence is when Nancy falls asleep in class. The kid reading the poem and the way he makes his voice quaver, followed by the body in the bag being dragged down the hall, it’s great. Let’s not forget a very young Johnny Depp made his debut in this flick. It’s all good.
Final Thoughts: This is one of my top 5 horror movies. It’s easy to get past the dated elements and some of the more cheesy scenes and appreciate that the flick offers scares that were original back before all the other Nightmare movies came out. As for those other ones, it’s only worth watching them for the unique kills but other than that, they are skippable. And the reboot from 2010, I hated it. Just go with the classic and never sleep again.
Dawning Creates 