Wednesday Minute
No. 189 | October 27, 2010

Crooked Numbers

Our theme this week
Horror film franchises from the 1970s to today

Featured this week (theme introduction)
Monday         —   The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (6 films, 1974–2006)
Tuesday         —   Friday the 13th (12 films, 1980–2009)

A Nightmare on Elm Street

The franchise films
1.  A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), Wes Craven, director
2.  A Nightmare on Elm Street 2:  Freddy’s Revenge (1985), Jack Sholder, director
3.  A Nightmare on Elm Street 3:  Dream Warriors (1987), Chuck Russell , director
4.  A Nightmare on Elm Street 4:  The Dream Master (1988), Renny Harlin, director
5.  A Nightmare on Elm Street 5:  The Dream Child (1989), Stephen Hopkins, director
6.  Freddy’s Dead:  The Final Nightmare (1991), Rachel Talalay , director
7.  Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994), Wes Craven , director
8.  Freddy vs. Jason (2003), Ronny Yu , director
9.  A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010), Samuel Bayer , director

The villain
Freddy Krueger, portrayed by Robert Englund (1–8), Jackie Earle Haley (9) (Englund played the character for the 1988-1990 TV anthology series, Freddy’s Nightmares)

Overview
One of Wes Craven’s inspirations for Freddy Krueger was the song “Dream Weaver,” a top ten hit of 1976 for Gary Wright.  Now that’s a scary thought.  I must have heard that song a thousand times—and I can’t say I didn’t want to scream sometimes—but I somehow managed not to go off the deep end.  Craven, it appears, was not so lucky—though whatever trip he took to the dark side turned out to be a lucrative one.

A Nightmare on Elm Street played with the idea of mixing dreams and reality (long before Christopher Nolan was on the scene).  Freddy Krueger appears as a stalker who inhabits the dreams of teenagers in Springwood, Ohio.  Years before Krueger had been a child murderer.  Released on a technicality, he was killed by the town’s angry parents, and as the series kicks off, he returns to wreak his vengeance.  Teens on Elm Street mysteriously die, apparent murders and suicides, but it’s actually nightmares of Freddy that do them in.  A deformed figure with a razor-studded glove and fedora, Freddy kills his victims in their dreams, thus causing their death in real life as well.

In the first of the films, Nancy Thompson loses friends and has terrifying nightmares of Freddy herself.  She struggles to overcome her fear, and when she does, she destroys whatever power he had to do her harm.  Freddy returns in other films to continue to terrorize the town’s teens and families, wiping out the children of poor Springwood.  In The Final Nightmare, a resourceful doctor pulls Freddy from the dream world and she finally dispatches him with a pipe bomb.   But in the world of horror films, there is nothing that is “final” (not if audiences continue to buy tickets).  Freddy has made a few more appearances on the screen, including this spring’s remake of the original.  The film made more than a hundred million at the box office, and the nightmares on Elm Street are a sure bet to continue.

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A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
Wes Craven, director
Wes Craven, writer
Jacques Haitkin, cinematographer
Trailer

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Quote of note
Nancy:  But what if they meet a monster in their dreams, then what?
Glen:  They turn their back on it.  Take away its energy and it disappears.
Nancy:  But what happens if they don’t do that?
Glen:  Well, I guess those people don’t wake up to tell what happens.
Nancy:  Great.
—Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp), Glen Lantz (Johnny Depp), A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

…58…59…60.