Director Chuck Russell (The Mask, The Blob) shares co-writing credits with Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, Frankenstein, The Blob, The Fly II) and series originator Wes Craven in an attempt to correct Jack Sholder’s cinematic atrocity known as A Nightmare on Elm Street 2. However, what results is an inconsistent work which seems as if Craven were rushing toward putting an end to his famed nightmare demon known as Freddy Kruger.
Six years after the morbid events at 1428 Elm Street, Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp, A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Outsiders, Rumble Fish, New Nightmare, Shocker), the new psychoanalytic hot shot on the mental rehabilitation scene, is assigned to work with a set of teens who are suffering from what the medical staff diagnose as mass hysteria. What the teens have in common is the fact that they are all Elm Street children and, as was their new counselor, are being preyed upon in their dreams by Freddy Kruger (Robert Englund, A Nightmare On Elm Street, Dead & Buried, New Nightmare).
Arguably, no other series has been prey to such a weak series of successors (it’s a toss up between Freddy and Mike Myers). Even with the writing assistance of Wes Craven (perhaps returning to the page out of rage for what Sholder did with the sequel and the fear that Russell, in his directorial debut, would do the same) and Frank Darabont and rising stars Patricia Arquette (in her first role) and Laurence Fishburne in tow, the work comes off lukewarm at best. Yes, some argue that it is the best of the A Nightmare on Elm Street (NOES) anthology that Craven didn’t direct, but that is allowing for too much. What can be granted is that the film is a fast paced narrative with duel plots at its climax which retains the audience’s attention throughout. However, even though Craven was holding the pen, the ideas and concepts contained in NOES 3 are weak and oftentimes contradictory.
Wisely, Russell ignores his predecessor and picks up where the original left off and respects the metaphysical principles governing Freddy, yet, with little introduction, we are presented with a slew of new Elm Street children (unfortunately acknowledging there will always be kids living on Elm Street and consequently negating Freddy’s m.o.). Yet, considering Craven and Darabont are men of ideas, I found it intriguing when Nancy refutes Neil Gordon (Craig Wasson, Malcolm X, Body Double) and Elizabeth Simms’s (Priscilla Pointer, Blue Velvet, Carrie) psychoanalytic theory that the individuals’ nightmares are a symptom of guilt and an overactive sex drive. I eagerly anticipated the remainder of the film to iconoclastically mock Freudian theory (Freddy appears as a phallic snake at one point, painted dark green to stray from the overt penisness of the character’s pink tonality). However, to my dismay, we watch as Joey Crusel (Rodney Eastman) is sucked into Freddy’s realm due to his longing for Marcie, that is, Freddy veiled in the guise of a bodacious nurse. (The scene is also surprising in that Craven was behind the series’ first instance of gratuitous nudity.) Jennifer Caulfield (Penelope Sudrow, Dead Man Walking), a girl whose dream it is to one day travel to Hollywood become an actress, dies due to her vanity. Nancy’s father, Donald (John Saxon, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Enter the Dragon, Black Christmas, Tenebre, From Dusk Till Dawn, New Nightmare), now a hopeless alcoholic, dismisses his daughter’s pleas for assistance after she informs him that Freddy has returned. He dies shortly thereafter. Even more baffling in this regard is that we have figures which, as far as the audience can see, fail to exhibit guilt or lusciousness. Phillip Anderson (Bradley Gregg, a Feldman effigy, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Stand by Me, The Fisher King) dies in a gruesome, yet creative manner, as Freddy mocks the teen’s interest in marionette puppetry as he extracts the veins from the boy’s feet and hands as he directs Phillip out of a high rise window. The film’s main head scratcher in this regard involves the death of the heroine, Nancy, as she meets her demise in an attempt to save her patients. This is yet another reason why I believe Craven attempted to obstruct, if not eradicate, the path for NOES 2-esque effigies: He killed off the original film’s star but, given audience appeasement, couldn’t force the demise of all the central characters.
In lieu of the thematic inconsistencies, I was pleased to have Freddy’s genealogy as the “Bastard Son of a Hundred Maniacs” (which served as the segue into NOES 5) presented as well as the implementation of Freddy casting his victims into their own private nightmares. Admirably, Craven sets another precedent in presenting a cast of fighters instead of flighters (the theme would be carried throughout the remainder of the series). However, and perhaps an ill judged move if Craven’s intent was to close the Freddy book, the fact that the director is the one responsible for what many cite as the tragic flaw of the figure of Freddy, that is, the antagonist’s personality shift from malicious demon to wise-cracking rebel as Kruger begins to quip and pun each homicide. Why change the pattern if this was the end all to the character?
Once again, we are granted the signpost color of red (sans green this go around) as an omen for Freddy’s ensuing presence. Also of interest is Angelo Badalmenti’s score which, though utilized to a staggering degree in the works of David Lynch, is hardly noticeable in NOES 3. Patricia Arquette (Ed Wood, True Romance, Lost Highway) proves she can do one thing well in the role of Kristen Parker and that is scream. Lastly, Doug Beswick’s (The Empire Strikes back) gives us the skeletal remains of Freddy in a homage-quality version of Ray Harryhausen’s work.
How does Chuck Russell’s film stand in relation to the original? It doesn’t. How does Wes Craven and Frank Darabont’s writing fair as a horror script? Minutely above average. What does this signal in the greater scope of the legend of Freddy? Considering it is valued by some to be the best film aside from the groundbreaking contributions when Craven was behind the camera (I refute the former, citing NOES 5 as being better structured and imaginative), it serves as a sad precursor to a series of cinematic carnage which, in the wake of having a multitude of creative, original directions to guide the sequels due to the work’s basis in the subconscious, more often than not, stalwartly resorts to the quickest, most easily sold, route to the bank.
-Egregious Gurnow
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
