Movie Review: A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)

Starring: Jackie Earle Haley, Rooney Mara, Kyle Galner, Katie Cassidy, Thomas Dekker, Kellan Lutz
Directed By: Samuel Bayer
Written By: Wesley Strick, Eric Heisserer
Grade: D+

From the beginning my expectations for the Nightmare on Elm Street remake were pretty low. There was no way it could compare to the classic slasher that gave birth to one of the most striking serial killers in horror cinema, blurred the lines or reality and fiction, and gave us some of the most iconic death scenes. Michael Bay and Platinum Dunes’ involvement didn’t help matters as they don’t seem to want to bring out anything new or intriguing with their remakes; just to take the easy way out and regurgitate what has already been done and giving us a lesser version of the original film.

The news of a Freddy Krueger void of the legendary, Robert Englund, attached seemed like it had even less promise. Englund brought life to Freddy; making him demented with a snappy, dark sense of humor and even more in your face and insane. He was wildly entertaining and chilling at the same time. Was there anyone who could utilize everything that Freddy Krueger was? I couldn’t even think of an ideal actor to play this let alone a realistic choice.

Then I heard the news that Jackie Earle Haley was going to play Freddy. I could see it. I never would have thought of Haley, but it was perfect. Suddenly, there was hope for the Nightmare remake. Jackie Earle Haley’s performance in Little Children was incredible; the best part of an already very good film. He brought out the inner demons of a child molester so he could handle bringing out a child murderer, couldn’t he? A big part of the film relies on Freddy and how he was brought out. I had confidence that Haley could revitalize the darkness and intensity that Freddy embodies. I still think he could have.

Haley really wasn’t given much to work with though. Freddy’s lines are truly atrocious. They are extremely bland, yet they try to portray them as something witty, funny, and menacing. Just because Freddy is saying them doesn’t magically make it any of these things. The delivery is all wrong too. Every line is said so slowly, it makes Freddy seem like he is slow himself. I wouldn’t even wait for him to say his line; just get the hell out of there. He probably wouldn’t even notice. The worst part about Freddy in the movie is the director clearly wasted Jackie Earle Haley. I know he is capable of a creepy and sinister performance; I’ve seen it from him. The delivery was wrong, maybe this was his decision but I have a feeling it was the director’s. The very small moments that had a sense of something promising seemed like it was Haley’s improvisations. And I mean very small things. In the opening of the film, Freddy appears. At first it is just the shadow of him. Then we get a shot of his “finger knives”. The way he taps them together is menacing, clamping them together, as if in anticipation. My beginning thoughts of the film were actually good. It seemed that Freddy would be creepy and mysterious. It didn’t take me long to figure out that this would only be one of the ever so brief moments where any real sense of the character of Freddy would be brought out.

It is somewhat discredited towards the end, but for a good part of the film they try to make Freddy sympathetic. I knew without an enticing back story, the film couldn’t have been interesting, not enough to at all warrant this film. Rob Zombie’s Halloween is definitely flawed, but the best part of the film is the back story. What’s the point of a remake if it isn’t going to bring anything new to the table? Especially when talking about classics like Halloween and A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Beyond the general tone of the film and characterization of Freddy, the real value in having Haley on the film is really going in to the character of Freddy; the man, the monster, and how he became that way. They did end up going in to the background of Freddy, but actually not much more than what was in the trailer. What we do see paints him as sympathetic. It also doesn’t show his mindset, intentions, or anything of his reality as a human, the monster he became, or the downward spiral that made him transition from one to the other. How did he reach this powerful state that fed off of fear and revenge? Sure we know why he wanted revenge, but that is different than taking any exploration in to the subject. This discovery and mindset is what Haley really could have brought out and should have been the main attraction in having Haley on the film. None of that is utilized though.

Aside from a lot of the dialogue just being bad it seemed unnatural. I don’t know how many times I thought “that’s not Freddy” or “he would never say that”. One instance of this was when Freddy begins explaining medical conditions of the heart and when and how it might fail. This might have worked in another movie, but all I could think of was “that is not Freddy”. He has ominous or quick snappy lines, he doesn’t have long explanations of life and death. I don’t mind bringing a new identity to Freddy. Heck, that was actually the thing I liked most about the new Halloween movies and why I admire Rob Zombie for taking the risks that he did with the two films. Freddy just seemed completely forced. He is never really established as a character either way. Freddy’s original identity is never brought out and no new identity is established either. The result is something very bland, put off as something far better than what we actually get.

The basic plot is the same with a few character changes. Nancy is the only character with the same name and many of the others have some sort of character, trait, or story change. This works and doesn’t take anything away from the film. Majority of them not being a group of friends as they were in the original seemed like they would be less likely to be all going through the same thing with Freddy tormenting them. If Freddy was in control of their dreams I can see him planting what he wants in their minds, despite their lack of talking or realizing what’s going on with each other. So this really isn’t a problem, just different (which I am totally fine with and actually encourage).

I regret that Kyle Gallner was in this movie for the sake of his career. At the same time I am extremely thankful that he was in the film for the sake of giving me a little bit of enjoyment while watching the film. Hands down he gave the best performance of the film. He has charisma, spark, and was extremely likeable as Quentin, essentially the Johnny Depp replacement. I also thought his character was far more likeable. This might have something to do with looking back on Glenn in the original as goofy and careless, which might not have been the impression in 1984.

While Quentin does make a few stupid judgments, overall his character is pretty smart; doing what he has to in order to survive, save Nancy, and put Freddy to rest. Gallner made me actually care what happened. He brought me in to the film; an attachment that never fell flat throughout the film.
Those who felt Heather Langenkamp’s acting was cheesy in the Nightmare on Elm Street films will probably prefer the more subtle approach Rooney Mara takes. Personally, I prefer Langenkamp’s Nancy and the character Wes Craven created in her. She is one of the stronger female slasher characters, figuring out what she has to do to survive and doesn’t resist standing up to Freddy; something no one did before. Nancy is still a strong character here and for the most part she is brought out realistically by Mara. She seems slightly less active as a character, but she still tries to hit things head on rather than ignoring what is happening.

Kellan Lutz did fairly well for the screen time that he did have, although right as he was talking about his dream he did get a little melodramatic. Katie Cassidy was not too different. She did well enough, but she there wasn’t anything particularly unique about her. She just seemed like a random blonde girl in a horror movie, scared and about to be killed. Some of this might have been in the writing. There were a few questionable moments where she was a bit over emotional and didn’t seem all that authentic. Overall, I was able to accept her character and what she was going through.

As you can tell from the trailer, many of the original deaths appear in the film. This is good and bad. The original has a few very iconic deaths so I can see the value in using them here to please the fans if not to give the film a brutal edge and satisfying gore factor. Even the deaths that are replicated are done far worse than the original ones are and this is with better technology. I’m not sure exactly what the problem was, but the effect is not nearly the same as it was in the original film. The scene where Freddy nearly gets Nancy in the bathtub almost seemed pointless as it lasts about a second. Why even show it? It doesn’t take time to build tension of suspense; it just gives us a little flash of scare (if it qualifies as one). I did appreciate that there were one or two new deaths. The first actually did take me by surprise which was refreshing. Still, the film could have done a lot better with the death scenes overall.

I went in to the film with an open mind, hoping for the best, but prepared for the worst. I can’t say that the low quality of what I saw was much of a surprise. I was still hoping it would deliver on some of the potential it had, going in to interesting themes or mind sets. I guess you can say it still brings out the original premise; the horrifying thought that dreams are no longer a safe place and you are forced to live a nightmare, not even one that is your own. Especially when Freddy claims he can control whether his victim never wakes up again or not, which makes his control all the more substantial and horrifying. It was an interesting move for Freddy to have taken the children as victims in life. It makes more sense for them to be the ones that Freddy would want revenge on rather than them just being the children of the parents who killed them (although, this is also true in the remake). By their parents covering up Freddy, they cover up secrets and tragedies of their pasts that scar them further.

The changes in the back story was a start and there was some potential, but none of these interesting changes in the back story were really taken nearly as far as they could have been. Even though the original premise is represented here, it is not done so with much craft, style, or developed realizations at all. Even though I was prepared for the worst, A Nightmare on Elm Street still disappointed me, especially in those ever so tiny glimmers of hope of what the film could have done. So much of the film is just laughable, almost in a depressing way; making it painful to watch for all the wrong reasons.