A Nightmare on Elm Street – 2010
A lot of years have passed since Johnny Depp’s boyish face appeared in the 1984 original Nightmare on Elm Street. For some reason Hollywood thought it was time for a remake, or, if you wish, a “revamp” of the original movie.
Hardcore “Nightmare” fans will find that it is impossible not to compare and contrast this new version to the old school one. But then most remakes follow along the same pattern, one is always going to be better or worse than the other.
With sequels and remakes these days, the old Nightmare has been adapted to 2010 standards. So no more disheveled-looking teenagers with unruly non-Hollywood styled hair and clothes. Which let’s be honest looked as if they has been thrown together by their blind grandmother. There is also a much darker and more dangerous-looking atmosphere.
The scare-factor of the original story also came from its seemingly safe and sugary settings – a typical American suburban neighbourhood, with nice-looking houses, gardens and cars – and from the innocent and down-to-earth protagonists.
The original Nancy Thompson was the strong central character, the only one who could understand the nature of the monster and fight him off, and at the same time someone we felt close to and could sympathise with in her struggle to stay awake.
In the new version, the balance is shifted; the focus moves from one character to the other: the new Nancy – with sleek dark hair and cool clothes – shares screen time almost equally with her likewise stylish co-protagonists, and loses power and charisma in the process.
More screen time and quite a lot of lines are given to Freddy Krueger, too, so much so that you will be forgiven for thinking that surely, Freddy was not supposed to be chatting that much: it deprives him of part of his mystery and dilutes that aura of dreadfulness around him.
Needless to say, quite a few things did not need to be there: yes, Freddy was a paedophile, but we did not need the characters to find pictures and drawings for it to scare/disgust us. Yes, the angry parents did burn him alive, but we did not need to see him begging and crying.
The movie attempts an investigation into Krueger’s past in a kind of ‘prequel’ fashion – Hannibal Rising, anyone? – However since Freddy is the focus of the story and the main scare-factor we probably did not need to know more about him.
The conclusion we draw from watching this film is quite predictable, if you have to do a remake, you have to make it better than the first one, or at least as good. And this is certainly not the case, you might as well skip this one, and go and watch – or re watch- the old classic.
Review by Margherita Pellegrino
View the trailer
Visit the IMDb page for A Nightmare on Elm Street
Please feel free to leave a comment about this film, I would love to know what you think and I will do my best to respond!
