DVD Reviews

A Nightmare on Elm Street - Blu-ray Review

By Jeff Swindoll Apr 6, 2010, 14:59 GMT

"1, 2, Freddy’s coming for you." And here he is, phantom fiend Freddy Krueger in all his razor-fingered infamy. Wes Craven (Scream movies) directs this trendsetting first in the slash-hit series. The premise is simple: Freddy (Robert Englund) homicidally haunts the sleep of Elm Street teens. The results are terrifying and mind-blowingly innovative. There’s another film debut too: Johnny Depp. He plays the ready steady of the hottie mcsmarty (Heather ...more

One, two, Freddy’s coming to Blu. Three, four, it’s clearer than before. Five, six, you get some remake tix. Seven, eight, it sure looks great. Nine, ten, you’ll end up buying it again.

A girl is being chased through a dirty boiler room by a burnt man with a glove that has razors attached to it. She sits bolt upright in bed and we discover that her pursuit was just a dream. We find out that the girl is named Tina (Amanda Wyss) and the next day she meets up with some of her friends.

Nancy (Heather Langenkamp), Glen (Johnny Depp), and Rod (Nick Corri) are planning an unsupervised sleepover at Tina’s house. Eventually they find out that they’re dreaming about the same knife gloved boogeyman. That night when Tina goes into dreamland, she does not awaken.

The killer slashes her to death in her dream and her perplexed boyfriend Rod only watches in horror as knife wounds appear out of nowhere and Tina is bloodily dragged about the room by an invisible assailant.

Nancy’s father (John Saxon) is a lieutenant on the police force and brought in to investigate, but neither he nor her alcoholic mother Marge (Ronee Blakley) believe her stories of the dream killer. Nancy’s friends begin to fall victim to the killer one by one.

Nancy finds out that the dream demon was named Fred Krueger (Robert Englund) and the parents of Elm Street took justice into their own hands and burnt him alive. He’s now seeking vengeance from beyond the grave on the children of Elm Street. Nancy has to take things into her own hands if she’s going to survive to have pleasant dreams again.

New Line Cinema would introduce the world to both Freddy Krueger and Johnny Depp. The success of this first Nightmare would lead to six more (in varying quality) in the dream franchise. Of course, Depp would go on to bigger and better thing as well. It would also make studios salivate at the thought of ghoulish money making franchises.

Horror was always thought of as an easy sell since it had an audience and was relatively cheap to make. Craven takes it a step further in putting some thought into it and using a creative bent in telling of a killer that stalks dreamland. Freddy would eventually turn into a funny boogeyman that we forget that he’s also a child molester.

When news of the franchise getting a reboot I could only sigh thinking that it would be crap. Rumors swirled that they’d be going for a PG-13 rating, but then they cast Jackie Earle Haley as the red and green sweater wearing fiend and that just seemed right. The more recent trailer looks even better.

However, there are still some high hoops to jump through as Wes Craven’s original is basically a modern classic and Freddy a horror icon. For those, like me, who remember the grainy VHS then this new release will be a revelation (as the DVD was before it). Definition is even better. What may be nicer is that there are some glimpses of some of the sequels in the documentaries and the bits look really good too. Too bad that all of the sequels and maybe even a Freddy box set didn’t come out too.

A Nightmare on Elm Street is presented in a 1080p high definition transfer (1.85:1). Special features include a pair of commentary tracks. The first is dubbed the “filmmakers commentary” and includes writer/director Wes Craven, Heather Langenkamp, John Saxon, and cinematographer Jacques Haitkin.

The second is dubbed “cast and crew commentary” and features Craven, Langenkamp, Haitkin, New Line executive/founder Robert Shaye, Robert Englund, Amanda Wyss, Ronee Blakley, producers Sara Risher and John Burrows, composer Charles Bernstein, editors Rick Shaine and Patrick McMahon, effects supervisor Jim Doyle, makeup artist David B. Miller, and film historian David Del Valle. All other special features are presented in high definition.

Focus Points is a feature that when enabled puts up an icon on the screen when you watch the movie and hitting enter will take you to interviews/alternative scenes/etc. The interviews are in the documentaries, but the alterative scenes are only accessible through this mode.

Next are the 50 minute “Never Sleep Again” looks at the making of the film, the 22 minute “The House that Freddy Built” is about New Line Cinema, and the 15 minute “Night Terrors” discusses dreams. You also get three alternative endings (the 1 minute Scary Ending, the 1 minute Happy Ending, and the 1 minute Freddy Ending). The case also has $7.50 of movie money to go and see the remake.

Freddy never looked better and the first film is the high water mark for the series (and part three and the final nightmare). It looks even better in high definition and Nightmare fans will be pleased.

Some of the special features are still hidden behind some novelty special feature, but I was so happy with the disc that I didn’t count off. Now bring on Dream Warriors (my personal favorite behind the original).