A Nightmare On Elm Street [Remake]

A Nightmare on Elm Street
Directed by: Samuel Bayer
Horror, 2010
USA, 95 min

So what the heck where they gonna come up with the burst the bubble with this one? I’d read online reviews claiming that it was a more or less scene for scene remake. This was obviously bollocks, as it’s not a scene for scene remake, but a rather shallow thingy that simply walks in the shadow of that awesome 1984 original. I had high hopes for A Nightmare on Elm Street as I’ve actually enjoyed quite a few of the recent remakes – Marcus Nispel’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2003 was brilliant, it looked just as gritty and dark as it should have. Despite Michael Bay answering original cinematographer Daniel Pearl, back for a second shot at TCM almost fourty years later “Just make them fuckable!” when he questioned “How do you want me to shoot this movie?”, TCM still made an impression, so did Nispel and Pearl’s collaboration on Friday the 13th 2009, with it’s furious twenty minute opening rampage. Zack Snyder’s reworking of Dawn of the Dead 2008 was a great date flick as my wife squeezed bruises on my arm during that one. Breck Eisner’s The Crazies 2010 is also a neat remake, taking it to a darker ground than Romero’s original. Alexandre Aja’s The Hills Have Eye’s 2006 picks up wonderfully when they get into that fucked up post atomic testing village, even if the main monster is a rip off of Chris Cunningham’s Rubber Johnny 2005.

Great original movies that spawned great remakes decades later, which is perhaps why the lesser entries into the original batch ended up being such shitty remakes… Bloody Valentine 3D, Prom Night, Boogeyman, blah, blah, blah… you know what I mean.

Anyway I was really hoping that A Nightmare on Elm Street would scare the damned pants off me once again, as this is one of my most favoured movies of my youth. I saw it as a teenager during a visit to my uncle in the UK. Yeah there has been some great movie moments in my family as we all had a tendency for watching horror and listening to cool music on family gatherings. Go figure. So my parents, my kid brother, my two uncles and their wives where all sat in that living room awaiting to see what is said to be the best scary movie of ages. The tape goes in and the shit kicks in. Playing the part of obnoxious nephew I made a point out of shocking my younger uncles wife on any given occasion. Obviously my scaring her ended up being the movie scaring me as it’s innovative storyline of a dream stalker killing off the kids on Elm Street took over. After the movie my aunt turned to me and said something along the lines of Right you little bastard, I wont tell you when, but sometime during tonight I’m going to come back down here and scare the shit out of you when you least expect it!” Haw haw haw yeah as if you could… but the longer the night went the more wound up I got as every sound heard could have been aunt on her way down to fulfil on her promise. Or Freddy Krueger – sleep deprivation plays sinister tricks on a tired teenage mind. Needless to say I was completely freaked out and scared shitless by the time day broke.

So the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street had a lot of anticipation ahead of it when I two decades later sliped the DVD into the machine… to be modest, it’s somewhat of a let down! I can’t really understand how you can go wrong with a classic movie like this. A classic movie with the shittiest ending of them all, something that really needed redoing right, and they didn’t even tidy that up did they!

As mentioned, it’s not a scene for scene remake, it does live it’s own life, but for some reason the filmmakers have decided to tip their hat’s at certain iconic moments of the original on more than one occasion which ends up being irritating more than fun references. The death of Tina, Tina in a body bag, the magnificent glove in the bathtub moment, Krueger coming out of the wall and the shitty shock ending. I have no time for repetitious in jokes when they bring fuck all to the narrative. But it’d make for a great drinking game if you were up for it.

The core of the story is never the less the same - parents torch peddobear, crispy peddobear comes back and kills their kids in their dreams. I feel that they missed a great opportunity to bring something new with them to the game if they only had followed up the indication that the parents killed Krueger without any hard evidence. It would have been a grimmer movie, because then it would have been about Freddy taking revenge for being murdered without actually being guilty. They don’t, and Freddy is still just a kiddie-molesting bastard. Unfortunately the remake holds nothing on the original, as the magic of the original lies in the fact that it takes a while to realise that Krueger only can get to them when they sleep and there’s an element of good confusion trying to figure out when they are dreaming and not. As usual the remake has to waste time explaining shit that we don’t need to know and even goes as far as telling the audience how sleep deprivation works which really shits on the question and effect of not knowing dream from reality, because from there on it’s just after cheap shock value as Kruger from then on pops up when ever the fuck he wants. It’s also kinda insulting when loud heartbeats rumble on the soundtrack flagging each Kruger attack and the CGI background shatters into his rusty boiler room set. (No Fred, I'm not bitching about CGI, just how they used it!:) )

Oh yeah and five second analysis: I say let’s blame Freud for this one, as the attacks started after one kid, Dean started in therapy and to quote him “some shit from my childhood started coming up!” That’ll teach you to stay out of therapy kids. Better to be fucked up than dead!

With the amount of brilliant and sharp music videos Samuel Beyer has directed, I’d have had expected a step up in the narrative department as he certainly knows how to create some great images, but you can’t do horror with images alone, you need some sort of shit in there to activate the audience or its all just surface and no content. If you can tell a story in four minutes, then why the hell can’t you tell one in ninety minutes while you have the time to explore your characters and stuff. Go figure! Most likely because the movie was rushed and it feels that way too.

Characters are shallower than a saucer of milk. I don’t give a toss about any of them what so ever. Not even Nancy manages to evoke any sympathy this time around. There’s no time what so ever spent on presenting these characters to us, they just roam around as drones and don’t have a chance in hell to stay ahead of Krueger, and I can't wait for the killings to begin. Which in consideration aren't to inventive either. Kyle Gallner's EMO boy with sad eyes and smudged eyeliner isn’t enough to engage me and the kids never really interact with each other either, so there’s no real bond between them. Mara Rooney’s Nancy isn’t much cop either. I never feel the same commitment to her as I did Heather Langenkamp’s incarnation, and her drawing skills stay don’t change much between her childhood doodles and the ones she draws as an adult which kind of sucks. There’s certainly no Johnny Depp’s in the bunch of actors, although Rooney’s career will probably take off after she’s done with David Fincher’s reamericaniamake of Stieg Larsons Millienum trilogy. At times she actually does look like Noomi Rapace, so I’m sure she’ll pull that of with no problems at all.

Another disappointment with the A Nightmare On Elm Street remake is that there’s none of the witty dialogue that made the original such a blast either, and I'm not talking about Kruger's jokes, but the stuff that brought life to the characters. Remember Johnny Depp's famous last words?

GLEN swings his legs over the edge of the bed and shakes his head to clear the cobwebs.

GLEN

Wasn't listening to the tube,

just watching. Miss Nude

America's supposed to be on

tonight.

MRS LANTZ

Well how you gonna hear what

she says?

GLEN

Who cares what she says?

The mother gives up.

To be fair, it’s not all bad. If I was a rookie to the horror genre and hadn’t seen the original flicks, or even just missed the first few and only seen stuff like Rachel Talalay’s Freddy’s Dead 1991 or Ronny Yu’s Freddy vs. Jason 2003, I would probably have been impressed a lot more. On the plus side the movie does look great – it is dark, murky and brooding, there are a few effective shock moments, even if you can see them coming a mile away, and there is at least some sentimental value to those nods at the original the first couple of times. Jackie Earl Healey does take Kruger back to the sinister character that he was in the initial movie, and it’s a relief that the gags and wise cracks are more or less gone. But anyone working with prosthetics and special effects should know that your nose is the first piece of soft flesh to go when your face is on fire I'd have lost the ears and nose if it was my job to pimp my monster - nothing says scary as a gaping hole in a blokes face! So Kruger is simply a creepy guy with a melty face who once again gets the job done, but I still say the story could have been improved with a “wrongfully murdered” theme instead of the same old freaky Freddy back for more guts. Empathetic monsters fuck your mind much more than someone who rightfully got punished even if it was by vigilante force, so that’s a major error in my book.

Oh look! My original movie seems to have been signed by Robert Englund and original cinematographer Jacques Haitkin!

Nevertheless, I’m forty and not the primary audience for horror flicks anymore, and the movie obviously did work as it was one of the highest grossing horror remakes these last years taking in almost 34million dollars at the opening weekend box office and a sequel has already been announced.

The Invasion

The Invasion

Directed by: Oliver Hiershbiegel (& James McTiegue uncredited)
USA/Australia, 2007
Sci-Fi / Horror, 99min
Distributed by: Warner Video

Story:
Psychiatrist Carol Bennell [Nicole Kidman] has for the last year been divorced from her husband Tucker [Jeremy Northam], who decided to pursue his political career over his family, finds her self and son, Oliver, in the middle of an alien invasion with a political twist. After a terrible space shuttle accident a strange organism has been found that has the citizens all railed up. But pretty soon the government is proclaiming that there is no threat, and that they are prepared for this “alien invasion” But the alien spores are taking over the population, and even one of Bennell’s patients, is complaining that her husband isn’t her husband. After several strange incidents she starts to investigate the alien invasion with her boyfriend Ben [Daniel Craig], just to learn that the invasion is much closer to home than she ever could have guessed. Now her main objective is to stay awake and keep one step ahead of the “new” inhabitants of earth who want to take over mankind. Don’t fall asleep!


Me:
Honestly, was this necessary? Did we really need a new take on a movie that was first made during the Hollywood coldwar/communism blacklisting scare in 1956 by Don Siegel, updated and remade to splendor by Phillip Kaufman in 1978 and then again updated decently by Abel Ferrara in 1993. But, still, You can’t out do Kaufman’s fantastic version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, you just can’t! So why even try? Ok yeah, so I’ll give credit to David Kajaganich for his modernized political twist on the original Jack Finney novel, but still it’s just a dead movie. We know where it is going from frame one, and there are NO surprises at all. If you have a great story set up where the aliens have come to earth to create global peace, which they more or less succeed with by the movie climax, then why do you pull a 180 and totally fuck up a story that was going somewhere? If you wanted to surprise me whey the hell didn’t you just have the government crash the “Secret Lab” stomp them out and then have Nicole Kidman be completely zonked (as she is in that last part) so that she agrees to join Daniel Craig and the other “pseudo humans” in their new state. Then they all kill her child as there is no room in the “New” world for immune non-receptacle people. Then end it all with world peace and a race that is totally in agreement with everything. That would have fucked the minds of your audience big time. They sacrificed everything to become a united race. Kidman sacrificed her kid for global peace. That would have made an impact. And that would have been more acceptable. Because if the government wanted us to get with the programme, they would make us. They would turn us all to “pod persons” if they thought that was for the best. Not the incredibly insulting ending where the scientists save her at the very last second and cure the world… …only to have wars, murders, global conflicts back on the daily agenda. And then that ridiculous “happy family” ending where Daniel Craig is back to normal and Kidman gives him a “still not sure if I trust you anymore” looks (which isn’t much different from any of her other “looks” in the movie) just rips a hole in any credibility that this stinker ever had to start with. Now this isn’t all because of the director Oliver Hirshbiegel and Kajaganich, so let’s not point any fingers here. But if we where to point fingers, stick it in the direction of producer Joel Silver. As he found the supposedly two hour original cut boring and intellectual, he brought in the Wachowski Brothers [Yeah as in Matrix, se where I’m going! Part one rocks, then it all just goes down hill] to re-write the script and later still James McTiegue [remember that guy who fucked up Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta] to re-shoot shit. Like that Molotov throwing during the car chase bit. If anything ever felt out of place then that is the school book example. So according to internet rumours all that remains of the original vision is bits and pieces here and there…

The acting, lets talk about the acting. It’s possibly the worst I’ve seen in a long time, and I’ve sat through some really bad movies in my life time. Kidman can’t act. Period. She can’t act. Just name ONE movie where she is believable (apart from Gus Van Sant’s To Die For and you can’t say Kubrik’s Eyes Wide Shut, because you just think that she acted in that because she got her clothes off.) There’s something about her that just doesn’t work for me. She always looks the same, what ever she is supposed to be playing. Her “Oh, this psycho just tried to kill my husband and I on our honeymoon in the middle of nowhere” “Oh I’m Batman’s Girlfriend!”, “Oh, My sister and I are witches!”, “Oh I’m a ghost!”, “Oh, I’m Virginia Woolf and I’ve got a really bug nose!” faces are all the same she might as well be saying “Oh, I’m Nicole Kidman and you have to give me a shit load of cash so that I can look like this!” because there’s nothing there. She is a Stepford Wife. Daniel Craig! What is he doing in this movie? He was fucking brilliant in Layer Cake, but here it almost as if he says “you know what I’m Bond and I don’t have to bring anything to this movie any more!” (Because he did in fact get the Bond Gig during the shooting of this flick) Jeffrey Wright, that guy owned me since bringing Jean Michel Basquiat to life in Julian Schnabel’s amazing Basquiat biopic, and I just love him to death in Jarmush’s Broken Flowers, but here… A scientist who sneers, doesn’t believe in what he’s saying and might as well just be reading lines right out of a paper (which he in a way is doing), and not to mention Jeremy Northam, who other wise is amazing in authority figure roles. They just come off as completely uninterested in the story, which clashes hard with the behind the scenes footage where they all praise the plot and story… Strange stuff indeed. Perhaps they where exchanged for pod people?

Could it be that the director out of his league? It certainly feels like it, but at the same time you have to remember that Hirshbeigel directed the magnificent Bruno Ganz in the fantastic Der Untergang [The Downfall: Hitler and the End of the Third Reich], Ganz one of the biggest stars in Germany and that movie all takes place in a bunker, but still has you wanting more after the three hour extended cut is over. And not to forget that really interesting Das Experiment that all takes place inside a temporary prison where the experiment explores how far people will go in the roles of Jailer and inmate. Really impressive stuff, but Invasion… It never really reclaims the posture that it tries so desperately too build in the setting up of characters and plot, it just falls flat like a pancake from the sky. A movie plays along the line of “don’t fall asleep, or they will get you!” is just ironic, because this movie really puts the audience to sleep!

Finally the positive things about this stinker, and once again I have to go back to that script by Kajaganich. Using the pharmaceutical metaphors where we load our selves up on so much shit that even the “aliens” can’t see who’s who is brilliant and makes for good commentary on the quick fixes that mankind take today. Also the political statement that we wouldn’t let world peace happen is also very well scripted. Director Oliver Hirshbiegel needs a pat on the back because the camera work is what makes this film watch able, along side that original idea. Suggestions to DVD companies, if you ever re-release this turkey, make sure that there’s a Score only audio option. Those suggestive angles and rapid edits of Hirshbiegel’s together with John Ottman’s post-modern other world score are all you need to make this thing fly. Or even better put the director and screenwriter’s vision back together and let the audience decide.

Image:
1.78:1 [16:9 anamorphic widescreen]

Audio:
English Language, Dolby Digital 5.1 with Optional English, Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese subtitles.

Extras:
We’ve Been Snatched Before: Invasion In media History Documentary, 3 Featurettes; The Invasion: A New Story, The Invasion: On The Set and The Invasion: Snatched, Trailers for other Warner titles

PULSE

PULSE
Directed by: Jim Sonzero, USA, 2006
Horror / Thriller / Sci-Fi, 90 min.
Distributed by: Dimension Films

Story:
When Mattie's [Kristen Bell] computer hacker boyfriend Josh [Jonathan Tucker] starts ignoring her she goes to visit him after a mysterious phone call left on her answering machine. When she gets there Josh is obviously disturbed by something and proceeds to take his life in front of her eyes. Three days later Mattie receives an email from Josh begging her to help him. This is just the start of a series of strange events that seem to be triggered by the wireless technology that we take for granted as a strange ghost like figure glitches it's way into Mattie and her friends life scaring them beyond belief as they one by one fall for the curse that makes them want to take their own lives...

Me:
What a load of bollocks. Honestly, what a waste of time. Based on the far superior movie Kairo by Kioshi Kurosawa, this movie is just another in the way to long line of piss poor US remakes. The acting is appalling, when Mattie finds her hung boy friend the best she can do is blurt out an "Oh My God" which could just as easily have been in reference to the price of her cell bill. It just doesn't work. It's flat and even though they try to make it scary it isn't. In one of the many "featurettes" in the special features they claim to have taken a scary movie and enhanced it so that it's even scarier... Duh, listen here all you remakers, the originals work because they take a low key no frills approach to the spectres, ghosts and scary little white ghosts. They just appear, or they are already part of the scene. When Josh first appears in his flat they use this to perfection just like in the original, he's already there and just stands up. No soundtrack key, no glitchy sound effect, just natural and raw. But after that and Kristen Bell's worst line every delivery "Oh My God.", it just goes down hill. Musical keys all the time, I know that something is going to happen because all the classic Hollywood keys tell me to get ready for a shock, that's what turned me off western horror and made me start watching Asian horror instead. Nope, for me this movie did nothing, nothing at all, and the only thing that made me sit though it was the fact that they at least had carbon copied key scenes from the movie they are trying to outdo. It's also very obvious that Sonzero comes from the music video side of the spectrum. Because there's a feeling to the movie that I can't put my finger on it, but sometimes a movie is all look and no feeling (or acting] and that's a good sign that it's a music director trying to pull off something he can't. Niespel's TCM [2003] remake works in some ways, Tarsem's eye popping The Cell [2000] work's, they have great visuals, rather good acting and the movies have a storyline that create an interest. The last I heard of Sonzero is that he's helming Clive Barker's Hellraiser remake. That is one hell of an original movie to try to remake, and it's more than likely going to be one of the last nails hammered into the last few years remake craze. But perhaps this is a good thing; at least we'll not have to see favourite movies desecrated again and again until the next wave hit's us.

So stay away from this movie, and put your money on buying the original there's a very obvious reason why this film bombed at the theaters.

Image:
Widescreen 1.66:1. For some reason the creators of this movie thought that giving the "ghost scenes" and the "other side" a washed out grey scale look would help the movie, but in my opinion it didn't. It just adds to the fakeness that wasn't anywhere to be found in the original.
Subtitles in English [H.O.H.] and Spanish are optional.

Audio:
Dolby Digital 5.1 & French Dubbed Dolby Digital 5.1

Extra:
A bunch of deleted/additional scenes, including a totally anticlimactic death of Dexter scene that is so lame I'm lost for words. Creating the Fear a making of and featurettes focusing on the visual effects and one on the paranormal phenomenons found in Pulse. Two commentaries that I'm sure never to endure listening too, and the theatrical trailer.