A Nightmare On Elm Street Review

The 2010 reboot of this franchise is just a complete mess. For a horror/terror film to be neither scary nor terrifying isn’t so good. I didn’t once jump or twitch in my seat, expecting every shock, surprise and scare from Freddy. I didn’t leave the theater thinking I’d never be able to fall asleep soundly again. The movie just did not deliver on what looked like promising potential in terms of having Oscar-nominee Jackie Earle Haley play Freddy Krueger. The film was, at the end of the day, like a typical, bad, B-grade slasher movie. The typical stuff, you know. A bunch of incompetent, eyeliner-wearing teenagers getting slashed in their dreams by Freddy one by one.

Speaking of Freddy Krueger, you just can’t recreate such an iconic villain. You just can’t. I was hoping for Jackie Earle Haley, who’s one hell of an actor, to be able to pull it off. But at the end of the day, no matter how good an actor they got, it would not have made a difference. This Freddy Krueger was not just not scary but boring as well. Every time he showed up on screen I groaned a little. I was a little disappointed to see that the current Freddy Krueger looks the same as the 1984 version. There were no improvements whatsoever in the makeup, further diminishing the scare factor. The only thing I enjoyed about Freddy Krueger is what I now call the ‘Rorschach voice’. The low growl of Jackie Earle Haley is very distinguishable and I love how it fits in with the character of Freddy.

The movie did one thing for me. It kept me guessing what was real life and what was a dream. I caught it early a couple of times but otherwise I didn’t know if the protagonists were awake or asleep until it was revealed. I wished there was more to the story line. There were absolutely no significant twists or surprises in the plot keeping it dull the whole way through. Even when the story of Freddy Krueger was told towards the end of the film, there was a ‘this doesn’t really matter, we’re just telling you for the hell of it’ vibe.

At the end of the day, the movie doesn’t do anything for me. I was bored, unafraid, uninterested and could not wait for it to end. Go watch this film only if you have a low-threshold for terror. If you don’t, just don’t bother. You’ll be wasting money and time.

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Here are some more pics to look at. (Just because I got the press kit. Hehe.)