By Geno McGahee
With all this talk about another A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, I decided to revisit the 2010 remake and review it with an open mind. As the return of the original Freddy, Robert Englund, is cheered, many point to the Freddy that was played by Jackie Earle Haley as a lackluster perception of the character. Earle Haley stepped into a position where he could not possibly win. The horror fans were not willing to budge, but the truth be known, Robert Englund’s Freddy turned into a joke as the series went on and although the 2010 remake had some issues, it tried to set the character back to what it should have been throughout.
In 1984, the original A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET was released and it was dark and scary and the character of Freddy Krueger had people hiding their eyes. The follow-up was laughable and forgettable, but then we saw DREAM WARRIORS, the third entry and that was an intense continuation of the first but we began to see a budding problem. Freddy was shifting from scary to funny and the emphasis on his one-liners was becoming the focus. By the fifth entry, Freddy lost all his horror mojo and was just clinging onto bad writing and the shell of what he used to be. Wes Craven attempted to resurrect him with the strange “A NEW NIGHTMARE”, which did some things right, but was overall too different to score and “FREDDY VS. JASON” brought back the funny Freddy, shifting the series back to the problems it had as a horror entity. So, as much as I scratched my head in 2010, wondering why they were remaking this film, after an overall examination of the series, it made all the sense in the world. They had gold in 1984 and they fell into the trap of trying to make the horror character mainstream and marketable to a bigger audience, losing what made it special to begin with.
We begin with Dean (Kellan Lutz), sitting at a diner, and struggling to stay awake. He nurses a coffee and drifts in and out as the danger looms. Kris (Katie Cassidy) shows up and tries to assure him that he is only having nightmares, but when he slashes his own throat in front of her, she realizes that there may be more. At his funeral, she begins seeing things. Freddy has begun haunting her.
Nancy (Rooney Mara) is having the same problem and approaches Kris and her boyfriend, Jesse (Thomas Dekker). There is something brewing but none of them can put their finger on it. When Kris falls asleep in class, we finally get a good look at the new Freddy and it is a new take on Freddy. Jackie Earle Haley was perfect for this role and there was an understanding of where Freddy was coming from and what he was going through. Freddy is creepy and sleazy, bringing this more sexualized approach to his victims and making you uneasy. There is a level of amusement but he is consumed with anger. This Freddy is very interesting and different from any other incarnation of the character. As much as this is a “remake” or a “re-imagining”, it has to be taken as its own film. It’s obvious that Jackie Earle Haley wanted to not copy Englund. He wanted to give his own take on the character.
Kris meets the blades of Freddy and Jesse is locked up, but he soon falls asleep and meets Freddy face to face, where we get an even bigger window into the character. When Jesse asks him what he wants, Freddy booms and asks him if he has the ability to turn back time or to bring back the dead. He gets furious. Freddy is apparently stuck in this world and the only thing keeping him going is this need for revenge on those responsible for him being there.
Nancy teams up with Quentin (Kyle Gallner) and they discover a link between the victims and themselves. They all attended a daycare center as children and this is when the truth comes out about their connection with Freddy Krueger. Kyle Gallner always looks like he’s filled with sadness no matter what I see him in. I guess it’s just the way he looks but his sad face really works well in this movie. When he gets mad at his father for killing Freddy and putting him into this position, he comes off very well and his father, Alan, is played by Clancy Brown. Clancy is a great actor and he does a great job in this small role.
The idea to defeat Freddy is the same one that they had in the 1984 film. If they can bring him out of dreamland, they can kill him. So, Nancy goes under with Quentin keeping an eye on her. When she’s struggling, wake her up and bring that burnt bastard into reality. When she encounters Freddy, he dresses her like a little girl, adding to the creep factor. They did not shy away from his molester backstory as the original did. In the original, it was hinted and then they turned it into “child killer,” but here, he is a molester and the parents did what should be done to molesters…unless you know for a fact they will be coming back and killing your children in their dreams. If that is the case, let the cops handle it.
Nancy and Quentin have their final battle and we have a satisfactory conclusion of A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET (2010). Now that I have sat back and enjoyed this movie for the first time since its release, I will honestly say that it is better than many of the Robert Englund entries in the series. Robert Englund is great and made a great character BUT Jackie Earle Haley has brought back the fear factor. Englund’s “I got your nose,” “Now I’m playing with power” and other notable humorous sayings that were so rampant in the fourth entry and on were totally gone from Earle Haley’s Freddy. We just had an angry vengeful spirit caught in some sort of limbo and he was not in a joking mood.
A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET is a little too glossy and the actors and actresses are a little too dolled up. Part of the appeal of the original was that the characters looked like real people. Here, we have models that look great even when they’ve been sleeping for 8 hours. It’s difficult to connect to them because of that. Hollywood has a tendency of dolling up the actors and actresses too much for these films and you start to think that it’s just a movie rather than experiencing it as you would with a true connection to the characters.
The visuals in this film are great and Freddy’s presence is tremendous. I love the shots they elected to use when showcasing their bad guy here. It made him more imposing. Both Mara and Gallner did well and worked well off of each other. Mara brought the sensitive toughness that Heather Langenkamp exhibited in the original. Mara has this mousy non-imposing look but an underlying toughness that came fully out when she combatted Freddy. It made sense why Freddy liked her the best. She was the most formidable.
Written by Wesley Strick, A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET is definitely worth a watch and may not exactly feel the same as the original series, but it’s far better than FREDDY VS. JASON and a better movie than many of the later Nightmares. This may have been a small step in the right direction, but it was a step nonetheless. Jackie Earle Haley really deserves another shot with his character. I’m not sold that a return with Englund is the best route at this point. I don’t think we can bring the character back to its roots after all of the years of joking around. I prefer the scary Freddy and if Englund can pull it off again, great, but Jackie Earle Haley surely can and did here. Had they just made this a little grittier and had a little more focus with the direction, this would have been a big winner. As it currently stands, I highly recommend it. It can’t compare to the 1984 flick, but did we expect it to?
Rating: 7.5/10
