A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

A Nightmare on Elm Street is the first film I am going to study. It is a 1984 American Horror, written and directed by Wes Craven. It is the first of the Elm Street franchise, which currently stands at 8 movies, not including the 2010 remake. It follows a group of teenagers, who are stalked in their dreams by a burnt and disfigured Freddy Krueger, a child serial killer. Unbeknown to the teens, Freddie is haunting them in particular, as revenge for their parents killing him in a fire. Krueger appears in their dreams, and kills them, therefore killing them in reality too. The film stars Amanda Wyss as Tina, the first victim of Krueger's, Heather Langenkamp as Nancy, Tina's best friend and main character, Robert Englund as Krueger, and Johnny Depp in his first feature film as Glen, Nancy's Boyfriend and third victim of Krueger. This film is amongst many low budget horror films produced in the 1970-80's, many featuring a sexual theme within the teenagers, which leads to their deaths. The first of these films, John Carpenter's, 1978, 'Halloween' which initially led to the term a 'slasher' film.

'A Nightmare on Elm Street' 1984
Film Poster

The film contains many influences from Wes Craven's life and experiences. In the 1970's a group of Khmer refugees who fled to the USA suffered from nightmares and would refuse to sleep, some even dying shortly after this. Craven found inspiration from this story, and used aspects within this greatly remembered horror film. Even Krueger is based on a couple of people in Craven's life, once being startled by an old man walking past his window, and once spending his childhood being bullied by a boy named Freddy Krueger, Craven naming his villain accordingly.

Cast of 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' 1984.

A main theme of the film is distinguishing dreams from reality. This serves the purpose of bewildering the audience, and keeping them questioning every movement. Is it real? Or is it a dream? The narrative constantly being interrupted by moments of dream. There is one clear motif in this film; sleep gets everyone in the end. The bed, a place of rest and comfort, turns into a haunting place of nightmares and death. Nancy is attacked in her bed, alongside Tina, Glen and Nancy's mother, who all died in their beds after being visited by Krueger. Tina is stabbed by Krueger in her dream, whilst in Glen's case, he is swallowed up inside his bed whilst he is sleeping, resulting in a geyser of blood and gore spurting up at the ceiling and drowning his room in red. This scene is particularly horrifying, the intense colour drowns his bland room, portraying how Krueger is slowly taking over their lives, and taking them one by one. Coming of age is also frequently referred to, with Freddie attacking the teenagers in particular, which could refer to the dramas and experiences we face during adolescence. A lot of things change for people during coming of age, so this would also be referred to with the idea of distinguishing reality from dreams. Sexuality, a big coming of age experience, is shown in many ways throughout the film. Initially, it is brought into the film by two of the teens, Tina and her boyfriend, partaking in sex, after Tina invited him, Nancy and Glen to stay to keep her company whilst her mum was out of town, and Tina didn't want to be alone after the nightmares of Krueger. Nancy and Glen are in a loving relationship, which is shown through the characters movements, but also their language towards each other. Another way sexuality is shown within the film, is in Freudian images, in very haunting and dream-like ways. For example, whilst Nancy is taking a bath, a clawed hand rises out of the bathtub in-between her legs. Tina's death also visually refers to rape.

Scene from 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' 1984

"In Nightmare, all the adults are damaged: They're alcoholic, they're on pills, they're not around," Englund has observed. Blakely says the parents in the film "verge on being villains." Englund adds that "[t]he adolescents have to wade through that, and Heather is the last girl standing. She lives. She defeats Freddy." (Wikipedia).

Freddy Krueger

Freddy Krueger, 1984.

Freddy Krueger is the main antagonist in the film franchise, 'A Nightmare on Elm Street'. Played by Robert Englund, Krueger is a child serial killer, severely disfigured after the parents of the teenagers set him on fire after finding out what he had done. In return, Krueger lives on in the teenagers dreams, seeking revenge in form of their children's deaths. Originally, Freddy Krueger was to be a child molester, but after cases happening in California at the time of production, Craven changed him to a child killer. In all of the scenes, Krueger can be identified by his red and green striped jumper, a brown hat, his burnt disfigured face and his trademark glove sporting knives out the finger tips, which he uses to kill his victims. When asked about his story behind Krueger, Craven said: "When I looked down there was a man very much like Freddy walking along the sidewalk. He must have sensed that someone was looking at him and stopped and looked right into my face. He scared the living daylights out of me, so I jumped back into the shadows. I waited and waited to hear him walk away. Finally I thought he must have gone, so I stepped back to the window. The guy was not only still looking at me but he thrust his head forward as if to say, 'Yes, I'm still looking at you.' The man walked towards the apartment building's entrance. I ran through the apartment to our front door as he was walking into our building on the lower floor. I heard him starting up the stairs. My brother, who is ten years older than me, got a baseball bat and went out to the corridor but he was gone." (Wikipedia)

In the original film, Kruger is often seen in the darkness, in low light. It is rare for Craven to show Kruger in the light in this film, which makes the character seem more haunting. His blood bleeds an oily colour, but in the dream worlds it is green. Throughout the film, his character not necessarily develops, but a lot is uncovered and learnt about him. Krueger has many super-human capabilities in his dream world, including being able to appear out of nowhere, as well as being able to walk through things, and manipulate objects. But, when he is in reality, he is just as human as the rest of the characters. At the end of the film, Nancy finds his weakness, as she announces that he is just a dream, and turns her back on him. He then disappears with a painful scream. His story of who he is and what he has done is told throughout the series of films, where is is revealed he is the product of '100 mainiacs', after his mother was raped by 100 men.

'A Nightmare on Elm Street' had an extensive makeup department, many of whom focused solely on Freddy Krueger, as his look demanded a lot more from them than anybody else. Kathryn Fenton was the main makeup artist, with RaMona Fleetwood as key hair stylist. David Miller was the special effects makeup artist, who would have focused solely on Krueger, alongside the foam latex technician Mark Shostrom. It was not only the burnt, deep scarred, sore face that they had to create, but also the special effects, such as the wound on Freddy's abdomen that protrudes lime green gunk and maggots, and the skinned face after it is ripped off by himself.

Englund had to wear a bald cap, which covered his ears and neck, and specially made latex pieces fitted on to make up his new skin. The latex is then worked into in paints. Considering the time the film was made, the makeup is believable, especially Krueger's skin. The blood that is shown frequently throughout the film is very bright, but that could be down to the dream world. There are shocking parts which are emphasised by the makeup, particularly the skull scene (above).