Wednesday, September 2, 2015

A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

We've been on vacation for a few days to celebrate my daughter Azalea's 5th birthday.  Before we left, we all watched A Nightmare on Elm Street together as a family.  Unfortunately this coincides with the passing on Wes Craven, so we dedicate this review to him.

 So, the plot is really simple. Teenagers fall asleep and Freddy Krueger kills them in their dreams.  As I saw in the realistic documentary The Matrix, if you die in your dram, you die in real life.  My theory about this film is about this film only and does not apply to any sequels, however many there are.

I had a hard time gleaning any information  about Freddy Krueger  from this film.  The explanation from Nancy's mom seemed really quick.  If Freddy kills children, why did he wait until everyone was in high school?

 Here is my theory.  The entire film is Nancy's  dream.  The scenes of reality or dreams are simply various levels of consciousness, including  lucid dreaming near the end.  It's really obvious  when she goes to visit  her friend in jail.  Why else would she be able to see his date at the hands of Freddy and know to go there in the middle of night? Or how did she grab his hat and bring it back to the "real world"?  That's because she didn't,  it's just a dream.  Also, she keeps escaping him but no one else can.  It's apparent that it's the work of one dreamer, not multiple  teenagers doomed to die.  That's why it's called A Nightmare on Elm Street, not Multiple Nightmares by Various People. Anyway, we all enjoyed this film (mainly for all its wonderful 80's special effects), and I will give it a 7/10.

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