A Nightmare on Elm Street Reviews

What can I say really about Nightmare on Elm Street. It has been said that it is a horror classic, Freddy Kreuger is iconic and it is an all round great film. I have to say, I agree. Is it a perfect movie? Not quite, the characters are not that well developed, but actually with everything else done so well that is a small gremlin. The film is shot in a non-cheap and atmospheric way with good editing and lighting that is never too dark or dim. The music also helps to enhance the mood without being too obvious, the script is smart, the story is compelling but what Nightmare on Elm Street really succeeds in doing is how it incorporates its scares. There is gore, but it is not used in a cheap and excessive way, and there are some genuinely suspenseful touches. The ending is surprising and very shocking. The acting is good, this is all about Nancy and she is very believably played. Johnny Depp went on to do better things but he's also fine. I'll remember Nightmare on Elm Street though for the terrifying performance of Robert Englund, Kreuger is now an iconic villain and after you see how Englund interprets him you would say justifiably so. And Wes Craven directs efficiently. Overall, the first of the series and the best and most iconic of the series. The sequels were mixed with a lot of gore and silliness and not much heart and suspense and the remake is not worth bothering with. 10/10 Bethany Cox

What can I say really about Nightmare on Elm Street. It has been said that it is a horror classic, Freddy Kreuger is iconic and it is an all round great film. I have to say, I agree. Is it a perfect movie? Not quite, the characters are not that well developed, but actually with everything else done so well that is a small gremlin. The film is shot in a non-cheap and atmospheric way with good editing and lighting that is never too dark or dim. The music also helps to enhance the mood without being too obvious, the script is smart, the story is compelling but what Nightmare on Elm Street really succeeds in doing is how it incorporates its scares. There is gore, but it is not used in a cheap and excessive way, and there are some genuinely suspenseful touches. The ending is surprising and very shocking. The acting is good, this is all about Nancy and she is very believably played. Johnny Depp went on to do better things but he's also fine. I'll remember Nightmare on Elm Street though for the terrifying performance of Robert Englund, Kreuger is now an iconic villain and after you see how Englund interprets him you would say justifiably so. And Wes Craven directs efficiently. Overall, the first of the series and the best and most iconic of the series. The sequels were mixed with a lot of gore and silliness and not much heart and suspense and the remake is not worth bothering with. 10/10 Bethany Cox

Ah, the land of dreams...the place that we feel the most safe, where nothing can possibly harm you, but what if those sweet dreams weren't made of this at all? What if those dreams were horrifying? What if those dreams were fatal? What if if you woke up from having a particular terrifying nightmare only to find your friends had the same nightmare and weren't alive anymore? Our parents often say 'sweet dreams' to us when we go to sleep but those words aren't enough to keep the dark forces at bay. And what better dark force to haunt everyone's dreams than Freddy Krueger?

Based on a series of occurences that Wes Craven himself read about, about a bunch of teenagers being killed in their sleep, this is Nightmare On Elm Street. The movie that launched an icon, and what an icon indeed. If you haven't heard of Freddy Krueger, I pity you for not knowing about him and I hope he'll visit you in your nightmares, because you deserve to be introduced to him.

Freddy is an icon, iconically portrayed by Robert Englund in all of the main movies in this franchise and Freddy VS Jason, this killer's look cannot be mistaken for anyone else, with his unsettling scarred/burned looking face, his signature hat and sweater, and of course his gloves with the claws. After the parents of the children of Elm Street burn him, he comes back from the dead as a dream demo to haunt said children/teens in their dreams and thus making it unsafe for them to fall asleep. 1,2 Freddy's coming for you, 3,4 better lock your door.

No one else can pull off Freddy quite like Robert Englund does, which is probably why the remake failed. Also I adore the Treehouse Of Horror parody of this with Groundskeeper Willie, that's one of the best Simpsons halloween episodes/segments in my opinion.

If you have not seen NOES yet, don't worry...Freddy is coming for you.

A group of friends (including Johnny Depp) all have the same nightmare: a man with claws and a Christmas sweater is trying to kill them. Unfortunately, the man is not just some bad dream: he is Freddy Krueger, and if you die asleep, you die forever.

This is Wes Craven's big break. His earlier films, particularly "Last House on the Left", may have been better, but this is the one that grabbed everyone's attention and today even those who haven't seen a single "Nightmare" film know who Freddy Krueger is: this film made Craven a master, and established a horror movie icon.

With one exception at the end, the special effects are also top notch for the time period. Bodies thrown into the ceiling, blood geysers spraying like mad. The makeup and costuming isn't bad, either... Freddy's burnt face gets even nastier when he starts to bleed maggots.

Mike Mayo is a bit cynical when he says, "Because his powers are so elastic, this little moneymaker can be killed and resurrected as long as he stays in the black." This is, of course, very true... at this point Krueger seems limitless, and even his origin is vague. Exactly how much sway this had over producers, I do not know. I can't see Craven in the office arguing that the film has sequel potential, especially since this was New Line's first major release.

If you see only one Wes Craven film, I guess I have to say make it this one. "Last House on the Left" and "Hills Have Eyes" are stronger, more edgy films, but they have not had half the cultural impact as "Nightmare". It is no exaggeration to say this film is a part of American history.

Ah, the land of dreams...the place that we feel the most safe, where nothing can possibly harm you, but what if those sweet dreams weren't made of this at all? What if those dreams were horrifying? What if those dreams were fatal? What if if you woke up from having a particular terrifying nightmare only to find your friends had the same nightmare and weren't alive anymore? Our parents often say 'sweet dreams' to us when we go to sleep but those words aren't enough to keep the dark forces at bay. And what better dark force to haunt everyone's dreams than Freddy Krueger?

Based on a series of occurences that Wes Craven himself read about, about a bunch of teenagers being killed in their sleep, this is Nightmare On Elm Street. The movie that launched an icon, and what an icon indeed. If you haven't heard of Freddy Krueger, I pity you for not knowing about him and I hope he'll visit you in your nightmares, because you deserve to be introduced to him.

Freddy is an icon, iconically portrayed by Robert Englund in all of the main movies in this franchise and Freddy VS Jason, this killer's look cannot be mistaken for anyone else, with his unsettling scarred/burned looking face, his signature hat and sweater, and of course his gloves with the claws. After the parents of the children of Elm Street burn him, he comes back from the dead as a dream demo to haunt said children/teens in their dreams and thus making it unsafe for them to fall asleep. 1,2 Freddy's coming for you, 3,4 better lock your door.

No one else can pull off Freddy quite like Robert Englund does, which is probably why the remake failed. Also I adore the Treehouse Of Horror parody of this with Groundskeeper Willie, that's one of the best Simpsons halloween episodes/segments in my opinion.

If you have not seen NOES yet, don't worry...Freddy is coming for you.

To be honest, even though I respect this movie and I believe it deserves its reputation, I can't say I'm really a big fan though. Even so, I still thoroughly enjoyed it and it is definitely a must see for any decent horror fan. Indeed, it is absolutely the biggest classic directed by the great master of horror, Wes Craven and, on top of that, it was also the acting debut for Johnny Depp. Above all, this flick really had a great concept. Indeed, this time, the big guy was not real but came in your sleep to kill you which was really neat. And of course, Freddy Krueger turned out to be one of the best bad guys ever created even if, later in the future, he became some kind of parody of himself. I guess, it didn't blow me away because I think the whole thing didn't grow old very well and some bits look nowadays pretty cheesy even if some of the creepy stuff is still pretty effective after all these years. Furthermore, the performance delivered by Heather Langenkamp was sometimes decent but sometimes also seriously weak. Still, the concept remains pretty awesome and this flick has been highly influential on all the slasher features that came afterwards. To conclude, it is a classic, I really enjoyed it and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

To most fans the original NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET is the best of the Elm Street films, whilst I’m not going to disagree with the consensus for me personally it’s a middling entry in the series. In terms of tone Wes Craven’s original film is one of the few legitimately scary Nightmare films. There’s a brutality and viciousness to Freddy’s attacks which is still legitimately unnerving and it’s interesting because this is the only film in the series that divorces Freddy’s dream attacks from their consequences in the real world.

Latter films will show Freddy dispatching someone in their dreams and then cutting to the victim spasming into death in the real world. In A Nightmare on Elm Street two of the major kills are shown completely subjectively and it makes them genuinely horrific. Tina being lifted from her bed and being dissected in mid air is terrifying and visceral because it’s so disconnected from reality. Glen being dragged into a vortex in the bed, despite it showing a little more of the cause and effect of his death, is similarly terrifying. In both cases our minds are left to do the leg work in regards to what horrible thing Freddy is doing to them in the dream world and it’s amazingly effective.



Also effective is Robert Englund as Freddy Kruger. Over the course of the season Freddy slowly starts to dominate proceedings, becoming almost an avenging jester by his fifth and sixth appearances, but in this film he is just utterly repellently evil. There’s an innate rapeyness to the character in his first appearances and it helps to create this truly loathsome character. With his grubby clothes, lecherous tongue and lustful eyes there’s a level of threat to the female victims that’s not really there in the later films. Simply put Freddy is scary and despite some shoddy effects he’s amazingly effective as a villain.

There’s an interesting thing going on with Freddy in this film in that there’s an element of masochism to the character, ostensibly he damages himself to show Tina and Nancy how powerful he is but there’s something that feels almost fetish about him slicing his body.

Faring less well are Freddy’s victims. The ELM STREET films are interesting because they never have the massive body counts that the FRIDAY and HALLOWEEN accrue in their later entries. At his most deadly Freddy kills six people, on camera, in one film. As such the ELM STREET films tend to focus on the ‘victims’ more than it’s stablemates. Because Freddy operates in such an operatic/theatric capacity we need to know a little bit about the characters for their dream sequences to work and as such there’s a genuine demand for the kids playing the victims to be interesting on screen.

A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET lays the groundwork for a trick that Wes Craven will play again in SCREAM in that he sets up a ‘fake survivor girl’. Tina is the first person we see on screen and is given a fair amount of attention until she’s ripped to shreds fifteen minutes into the movie. The problem is that the film only has four central victims and her death eliminates her from proceedings AND her boyfriend who largely disappears from the file until he’s killed half an hour later. As such the bulk of the films narrative falls on the characters of Nancy Thompson (played by Heather Langenkamp) and Glen Lantz (played by a debuting Johnny Depp). As such we’re left with a horror film that feels like it’s been rendered inert because we know that nothing can happen to these two leads until towards the end. There’s a lot of familial strife for Nancy (terrible parents is something of a meta-theme for the ELM STREET films) and occasional agitation from Kruger but it feels poorly paced at times.

Langenkamp does an admirable job as Nancy and she seems to get way more comfortable in the role as it progresses, but there’s a certain stiffness to her which takes some getting used to. Depp does okay in his role, it’s more interesting seeing Depp playing a straight-man rather than lathering himself in quirk.

The real star of the film is the style and art direction. As the series progresses it gets more and more overt in its stylisation practically becoming a day-glo cartoon by it’s fourth outing, but this first film is filmed fairly naturalistically and it gives the dream sequences and murders a real unearthly vibe. In particular Nancy’s dream in class, scored to distorted reading of a Shakespeare package and focused around the horrific image of Tina’s bloody corpse being dragged through the school in a polythene bag, is one of the most striking elements of the film. Craven talks at lengths about his interest in nightmares and how he used his own nightmares for inspiration and you can really see that in this film, there’s a dreamy, off kilter, quality to the nightmares in the film which mark it in stark contrast to the latter films and their zany, comic booky, dream sequences. In this film the dream world is a terrifying place even before Freddy Kruger shows up to perpetrate massive harm on your psyche.

What I find interesting is that despite being the ‘first’ of the ELM STREET films it doesn’t really set up the formula for the proceeding films. Freddy undergoes massive changes over the next two movies, the tone of the series changes, the focus on the dream world and the real world shifts to favour the former. NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET feels like a skeleton of an idea which the third film builds upon and establishes the thematics and conventions of the series.

I have had absolutely no desire to see this film all my life but seeing as I was getting into classic horror films, I decided to watch it and thought to myself "I cannot miss this!" My expectations were pretty high because it is the same director as Scream and I absolutely loved that! When I did see Nightmare On Elm Street, it wasn't as good as Scream but it was an absolutely terrifying, suspenseful and gruesome masterpiece!! What I really do love about this film is that it is one of those films that just play mind games with you. When you watch this film, you will be afraid to go to sleep incase Freddy attacks you in your dreams. That is like Psycho (not wanting to go into a shower in a hotel) and Jaws (not wanting to swim in the sea). The classic horror films are a lot better than the modern day ones because most of them new horrors use way too much violence with very little story. There is a remake of the film coming out in 2010 and I am sort of interested in seeing it.


A Nightmare On Elm Street is set in a suburban street called Elm Street where it falls prey to an old foe. A dead child-molester and killer, Freddy Krueger returns to haunt the dreams of the teenage offspring of those that burned him to death years before. So, Freddy is set out on a deadly revenge. Heather Langenkamp was awesome as Nancy Thompson. She is the main character in the film and she is the main victim of the nightmares and Freddy's mind games. Her character was like Sidney Prescott from Scream and I think that Langenkamp and Neve Campbell who plays Sidney Prescott look a bit like each other. Nancy Thompson is the main victim of the nightmares from Freddy. Freddy Krueger is a disfigured dream stalker who uses a glove armed with razors to kill children and teenagers in their dreams, which ultimately leads to their deaths in the real world in the film. He is now definitely one of my favourite film characters. Johnny Depp is another main reason why I needed to watch this film. It was his feature film debut and he is quite famous for this film. His performance as Glen Lantz was really awesome so it was a great debut. To be honest, I think it is one of his best films. Glen is a classmate of Nancy's as well as her boyfriend.


Wes Craven is starting to become one of my favourite directors! First he created a masterpiece that blew me away completely: Scream. And now he has done it again! To be honest, I find his suspense almost as good as Hitchcock. Every single second was gripping where you are clued to the film all the way through! It is definitely a terrifying horror film but I have seen scarier horrors but hardly any better horrors than this.


Overall, A Nightmare On Elm Street is a fantastic, terrifying and intense classic that totally deserves to be one of the best horrors and thrillers of all time. Krueger sealed his place as one of the biggest film villains of all time too.

It's hard to believe that there are people that haven't seen this movie. There is a man who follows you in your dreams. He kills you because that is the only place he can truly strike fear. Leaving a teenager alive to tell all their friends just makes business go up in Freddy's book; and gives him alot more minds to invade and lives to take. Killed after being burned by the townspeople after being let off for murders of several children, Freddy Kruger now bears a burnt body with the classic red and green shirt and old hat. This idea was first thought up by Director Wes Craven after being scared as a child by a bum with that same resemblance. A great concept that worked and stuck in the minds of it;s viewers, letting them know they are not safe.. even in their homes. That one thing is true, you know.. You have to fall asleep sometime. and When you do, you are all his for the taking! Robert Englund plays the perfect Freddy time after time and did amazing in his debut. He creeped out viewers by cutting off his own finger and controlling damage in dreams and making them stick in real life. Tina, a friend of the main character Nancy's suffers an exquisite death towards the beginning of the film where she is violently dragged across the ceiling by the knife gloved maniac with no one able to see him but her; all they could do is scream. Johnny Depp also makes his film debut in this one, making it the one film i would say gave him the chance for a death scene to never forget. If you haven't seen it, please do! After all, you have to sleep sometime...

Children: One, two, Freddy's coming for you. / Three, four, better lock your door. / Five, six, grab your crucifix. / Seven, eight, better stay awake. / Nine, ten, never sleep again.

"I probably could have saved her if I'd have moved sooner. But I thought it was just another nightmare, like the one I had the night before. There was... there was this guy; he had knives for fingers."

The story of this film is based around a group of teenagers who all begin to have nightmares about the same person (if you can call him that). They work out that this guy, named Fred Krueger, is out to kill them in their sleep. So we get to watch them in a battle to survive, loosing their friends and trying to stay awake for as long as possible.. because whatever they do, they can't fall asleep.

This is a classic horror movie that has produced one of the most iconic horror villains.. Fred Krueger. You will never forget this freaky, grotesque, disturbing, spine-chilling character after you watch A Nightmare On Elm Street. After finishing watching the movie, I saw part of the extras on the DVD and found out a little about how this character came about in the mind of director and writer Wes Craven. Apparently when he was just 7 years or so old, when he was about to go to sleep he saw a man looking out his window straight at him. He wouldn't look away, and turned to go to the entrance of the building. This freaked Wes out, so that was one of the main elements that came to mind with him about Freddy. That and a series of news stories about reports of people dying in their sleep. I think it is genius for him to come out with something original and unique compared to other horror films from that.

I loved seeing Johnny Depp in this, his first film. I bet no one could have picked up that he would be one of the most successful actors of his generation just from this movie, but obviously he got some attention from it and that's how he's got where he is today. Robert Englund was creeeeepy and terrifying as Freddy Krueger. He was just perfect when you think about it, he made Freddy one of the most iconic movie villains of all time. It was vital for Heather Langenkamp to give a good performance to make this movie watchable. She did alright to say the least. The rest of the cast were the sort of people that I wouldn't choose to watch a movie with them starring in again.

This is one of those must-see movies. See it before you die kind of stuff. So, if you haven't, I'm telling you now to go and see it for yourself!