Customer Reviews

Wes Craven's New Nightmare [VHS]

5 star:		(80)
4 star:		(45)
3 star:		(16)
2 star:		(15)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

Freddy was always Wes Craven's baby. The Elm Street sequels, without the creator's active involvement, veered increasingly farther away from his original vision, and Freddy Krueger as we knew and loved him did die in the sixth film. Evil never truly dies, though, a fact made clear by this remarkable, visionary film. Only the most ingenious of scripts could bring Freddy back to us in an acceptable way, and Wes Craven was the only man who could do it. Hearkening all the way back to the fairy tales of old, we learn that Freddy was only one incarnation of what could be called the ultimate evil. Stories, so long as they are told, have the power to contain the forces of evil; when Freddy was killed and the Nightmare series ended, that evil was freed from its bonds and thus given the opportunity to cross over to reality. The whole idea behind Wes Craven's New Nightmare is simply brilliant and ingenious, and it works fabulously on more levels than I will have space enough to expound upon here.

Heather Langenkamp, who played Nancy in the first and third films, plays herself in Wes Craven's New Nightmare. She is joined by a myriad of cast members and contributors to the original Elm Street film, including John Saxon (who played Nancy's father), Robert Englund (whom everyone knows played Freddy), Wes Craven himself, and a number of the men and women who worked with Wes and New Line Cinema to bring Freddy to life in 1984. Craven is working on a new script that will revive Freddy and pit him against his old nemesis Nancy. The only problem is that fantasy is becoming fact for Heather and her family, and the script begins to mirror real life in a frightening way. Heather begins having horrible dreams of Freddy, and her son Dylan (Miko Hughes) begins suffering from his own nightmares. As crazy as it sounds, Heather is forced to conclude that Freddy Krueger is somehow becoming real, and she will eventually have to reassume the role of Nancy in an effort to stop him from passing through the final gate from fantasy to reality.

Wes Craven's New Nightmare is to me the greatest Freddy film of them all. The idea of having cast and crew members of the original film serve as Freddy's conduit to true existence works amazingly well. Langenkamp gives a truly amazing performance in the highly personal role of herself, trying to save her son and her very sanity from the evil she once defeated as a character in a movie. Non-actors such as Wes Craven and New Line Cinema's Bob Shaye play their parts very effectively, and the images of Robert Englund that we see could not be in greater contrast to those of his character Freddy. There are a number of direct references and haunting similarities between the original film and this fresh and exciting new Freddy classic. Not only should these delight the Freddy aficionado, they serve to make the ultimate ending of this film believable and effective. Heather Langenkamp has to become Nancy once again to stop Freddy, only this time the battle is disturbingly real. Wes Craven's New Nightmare presents itself as real life rather than cinema, making this the most innovative horror sequel I have ever seen.

Some Freddy fans don't care for this film, while others such as myself absolutely love it. For some people, Freddy had become the witty, wise-cracking, over-the-top killer of the later Elm Street sequels, and these fans want this type of film to showcase Freddy doing his thing as many times as possible. To me, that is not the true Freddy. A Nightmare on Elm Street's original power was drawn from an incomprehensible foe that could kill you in your dreams and scare the audience to death in the process. He was evil; he just wanted revenge in the form of blood, guts, and terror, and he didn't need to make a big production out of it. It is that Freddy who now haunts Heather. This dark film may deliver far less of Freddy-ness in terms of body count, dialogue, and on-camera minutes, but that only makes Freddy all the more frightening and effective. Wes Craven's New Nightmare truly morphs the boundary between the real and unreal, delivering a level of suspense and evil that all the earlier Elm Street sequels could never hope to equal.

The DVD features a long-desired extra in the form of commentary by Wes Craven himself. He not only furnishes the reader with all sorts of fascinating trivia about the film, he also captures the true essence of Freddy as a monstrous villain and lends a philosophical appraisal of human nature and the archetype of evil in society. I see this film as a defense of the horror genre itself, one made abundantly clear in Craven's references to a career of anguish with the MPAA and censors in particular. It is the very existence of horror stories that allow evil to be contained in this world, and the eradication of horror films in particular, something a number of people would love to see happen, would truly let the genie out of the bottle and give free rein to evil in the hearts of men. Wes Craven's New Nightmare captures to a significant degree not only the attraction of horror but the absolute necessity of it.

Hey, I liked this movie a lot...in fact I saw it before it went into wide release at the Toronto Film Festival and Wes got a standing ovation. It's probably better than the original.

But I can't understand why any Amazon reviewer would be dumb enough to spoiler the ENTIRE movie in their review. And they don't even warn you! Hey--It's a horror movie. If we wanted to know what happens beforehand, we'd ask ya. The point of a horror movie is to be surprised.

If you're reading these reviews and haven't seen the movie yet, beware! There's a total spoiler post below, and you should skip it if you want to enjoy the film.

Heather Langenkamp (played by Heather Langenkamp), the actress who played Nancy Thompson in A Nightmare On Elm Street and A Nightmare On Elm Street 3 Dream Warriors, is now having terrifying nightmares of the fictional dream murderer, Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) and dismisses them as memories of working on numbers 1 and 3. After an interview, she visits Robert Shaye (played by himself) who asks if she'd like to star in a new ANOES film, directed by Wes Craven (himself). She declines, fearing for her son, Dylan (Miko Hughes, Pet Sematary) who's been watching the original film on TV. But as it turns out, Freddy is possesing Dylan's litte body, and Heather is scared.

Wes Craven's New Nightmare is a brilliant film, with much more charecter developement than any other sequels (although I still love most of the sequels) and is more of a fairy tale than a horror film. Other people, suh as Tuesday Knight, Nick Corri, Robert Englund, Marriane Maddelena, John Saxon, ZSA ZSA Gabor, and others play themselves in this one.

This DVD includes both a 1:85:1 widescreen ratio, and a 1:66:1 standard version. There are production notes, "Jump To A Nightmare" scene navigation, and an interesting commentary by director Wes Craven.

It's not enough to bring Freddy Krueger back to life one more time after his official death. But Wes Craven has to come back too with the original characters, Nancy and her stubborn cop of a father. But we cannot really revive characters in a film so many years after their first appearance. So Wes Craven pushes what he calls « only make believe » one iota further and farther. Freddy was only a disguise for a real bad spirit in the world (Anne Rice has done that with her vampires and the Queen of the Damned, or Stephen King has also used this formula with his Dark Man in quite a few novels, liek The Stand, and short stories) and this really bad spirit has decided to come back to the real world once and for all and under his own identity if possible, or under that of Freddy Krueger if the minds of people are obsessed by his existence. This evil spirit is of course the devil himself and it will be revealed in the very last scene. So the actors are playing their real parts and Freddy is invading their real world. It is then « make believe power two ». And it is all the more efficacious and effective because the actors are themselves and no fake identities. Wes Craven brings along his particularly caustic mind and spirit and really gets the mickey out of medical authorities, doctors, women and blacks alike, and all the fake myth about the protection of kids first and for all against their own parents. Wes Craven definitely seems to accuse society to be the real culprit, the real cause of all problems with kids, and grown-ups too. This society that classifies everyone in one little box and that can put a six year old boy in the schizophrenia box without realizing that it is going to make him schizophrenic. The classification creates the items that are classified in it. Any taxonomy is our own creation, our own delusion and we must get rid of all these taxonomies to maybe recapture some sanity and balance. But since Wes Craven is back do not be surprised if you recognize some tricks like the crazy phone calls borrowed from Scream and so many other films (it always works anyway). That's part of the game. Wes Craven borrows from everyone, himself included, and just shakes the cocktail differently and changes dressings. The sauce always becomes slightly more piquante when it is served a second time by our waiter Wes Craven. He even visualizes the first destruction of Freddy, the lynching of this child molester who attacks males first to kill them, and women second to enjoy their slow suffering and their yelling. So Freddy Krueger is roasted to death a second time, and it is when his face becomes the horny - ah ah funny ! - head of the devil. Can we hope the saga is really finished now ? Probably not. There must be some forgotten sequel somewhere, though seven is a magical number and the point has been made that it is not movies that make children epileptic but all the Freddy Kruegers, Tommyknockers, Candymen, and other boogy boogy bogeymen overfed on beetle juice instead of milk, kept in the cupboards of our minds.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Paris Dauphine & University of Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne

This is brilliant. The best elm street movie yet. The first time I seen this was about a year and a half ago, and I thought it was the worst, utterly boring is what I thought. Now, I just bought it the other night,'cause I felt like giving it another try and watched it, now I love it. It is such a smart movie, and a great twist in the franchise. Wes Craven thought a lot about doing this movie, he even said he couldn't find anyway to follow on from the sixth film. The film is hardly like a sequel, it almost feels like it's a completely different film, and not a sequel. The film changes to a docusoup, with some of the cast from the original movie, it even stars Wes Craven himself, Heather Lagenkamp (Nancy on the original) is in it, along with John Saxon (Nancy's dad) and a small cameo by Nick Corri (Rod on the original), and of course, how could we forget Freddy? Freddy doesn't do any more of the stupid comedy anymore, but he does have some good one-liners like "Hey Dylan, ever played skin the cat?" The gore isn't always big in this, but there are some sickening scenes. Also, Freddy has a different claw, a large, new and improved metal one, and he has a different looking face. The music is slightly better aswell. I like the way Wes brings back some of the classic moments in the original to this one, example: Heather picks up the phone on this, and a tongue comes out from it, which is also from the original. The ending is class, it starts as a killing at a hospital, then Freddy tries to attack the young boy Dylan from the cluds, as Dylan is running across a busy street, then we get to Freddy's real lair, he gets pretty freaky there. The one point I don't like though, is that this movie can confuse you a little. Apart from that... BRILLIANT!
So, this is the best elm street movie yet, extremely clever and quite scary. Don't miss!

After the first I thought another GOOD Nightmare would never happen, boy was I wrong! This movie does have a lot of slow not scary parts and that is why it didn't get 5 stars, but other than that it is definetly worth $13. Great ending and even greater story. BUY IT NOW!!!

Part 6 was not the final Nightmere. Why? Becouse Freddy's not dead. In this latest Nightmere, all the other nightmere films
were made to stop a real Demon named Freddy from entring the world. But now that the series ended Freddy can now enter the world and the only one who are going to try and stop him are WesCraven writter and drictor of the first film and the actress
heather Lankentop in the first film. This was the best one sence the first and is very fun to wacth. WesCraven should do another
one of these. I can't wait intil I get to see Freddy vs Jason to
see Freddy come back in the 21 censtory(I did not get to see the film at the movies so I am waiting for the DVD).

I first saw this movie on HBO an ordered the DVD soon after. In fact, it was the film that really turned me on to the Nightmare series. It stars Heather Langenkamp, Robert Englund, and Jhon Saxton, all of whom played in the original Nightmare and returned to play themselves. I loved almost everything about this film, especialy the awsome upgrade they gave Freddy.It was directed by Wes Craven, The creator of the series and the best director to ever make a horror film. It was a nice change from the other Freddy flicks. The plot could have been better though. the whole idea that Freddy was actually an ancient demon seemed stupid. Another thing I didn't follow was the little boy that played Heather Langenkamp's son who kept getting possesed by the demon. It just didn't fit with the film. Other than that,this was a great movie. I loved the way it trys to parallel the first Nightmare film. And it was the scariest one out of the entire Nightmare series. It was a well balanced production with a little action, a little gore, and no stupid love scenes. And this is the only one that shows Freddy the way he should be; a demonic phsyco killer. It is a more frightning, more demonic Nightmare film that will keep you on the edge of your seat! It was a perfect way to end to best horror series ever procuced. so if you are a Freddy fan, I would highly reccomend this exellent movie.

This probably isn't the best Freddy film to watch if it's your first time watching one. But I needed to see one, to get the gist, as I'm going to see the new `Freddy Vs Jason' movie in a couple of days. I've seen some Jason/Friday 13th movies, and I know the basic storyline behind the Freddy films, but I thought it would be best to see one. I probably should have watched one of the first ones, right?

This film has shades of `The Exorcist', `Poltergeist', `The Ring' and `Urban Legends 2: The Final Cut'. It has the best bits of all these movies thrown in. Unfortunately, I can't say which bits, cos it might give away the plotline. But you get the idea.

This film gets very confusing, and I found myself with my head in my hands throughout, trying to figure out what was happening. Wes Craven plays himself, as does Robert Englund. And according to the credits, Freddy Krueger plays Freddy Krueger. Right . . .There are quite a few actors who play themselves in this film, which I didn't realise, having not recognised anyone, including the lead actress.

There are quite a few mistakes I noticed in this film; mainly the microphone quite often appears at the top of the screen. Does no one watch these films anymore, in the editing room? Or were they on that tight a budget that they couldn't afford to? It's really noticeable.

It must have been really weird for Wes Craven to be in front of the camera for once. He was a natural too. Although he didn't have a big part, he had a considerably bigger part than in the first Scream movie, where he appeared for a split second (blink & you'll miss him!), as a janitor, wearing a Freddy-esque striped sweater.

The soundtrack to this film is absolutely fantastic! I really enjoyed it, and it was noticeable throughout the film, which was actually a good thing. I recognised some of the music, although could not place it.

Although it doesn't have as much killing as the Jason movies, Freddy has all the suspense and creepiness to keep you on the edge of your seat throughout the film. Without all the blood & gore that has Jason fans going back for more, it's hard to see why these Freddy films were as popular. I was disappointed that there wasn't more killing, and when there was, it was always in a dream - or was it? If you're after blood & guts, and teenagers getting killed right after they've done the deed, then you need to watch the Friday 13th movies. However, if you want to be jumping out of your skin, or wondering what IS going to happen next, then you're best going for the Freddy movies.

But if you're a fan of both movies, then you will have to see `Freddy Vs Jason', and get the best of both worlds. And who's going to win? After seeing this . . . I think it might be Jason, although I stand my ground, and say there's going to be sequels upon sequels!

Without a doubt this is the best one of the series to date. (I have yet to see Freddy VS Jason so that could change ;) )

I saw this when it came out in the theater and was blown away how well the story was written. The 1st Nightmare to most is the best as I can see how that is possible since it spawned all the sequels. However I look at that one as a set up for this movie which is so clever I am not sure how any Nightmare fan can honestly say this one is bad.

The story is about the real lives of the actors who played all the characters in the Nightmare series from the 1st movie. They portray themselves. The movie starts off with a bang with a great opening sequence. I am not going to give away what happens as that would spoil it. However for a 1st timer who is a Freddy fan this is a great way to start off the movie. It really does set the tone. The thing that is asked here in the movie is what is reality? Where does reality and fantasy cross the line and how can you tell what is real and what is not? A great premise and good spin on the whole series.

Is this movie loaded with tons of kills? No. Tons of gore? No. The tension however that builds in the movies is priceless and to any TRUE horror fan this is a must own and must see movie. It does help however if you are familiar with the Nightmare series to enjoy this one so it was written for the fans. With that respect if you are just getting into horror movies do yourself a favor and watch Nightmare 1 1st. Then watch this one. You really do not need to see any of the other in the series for this one to make sense but seeing the 1st one does help make it more enjoyable.