Have you heard the rumours about the new Freddy Krueger flick? There's said to be a new one coming in 2018. This is exciting news indeed...
OK OK, the last Nightmare on Elm Street remake was a flop: audiences didn't rate it and neither did the critics. In fact, to be brutal, even the trailer kind of sucks. (Way to butcher a classic!) But maybe 2010 just wasn't Freddy's year. We die-hard fans don't let that kind of thing get us down, right? Freddy is a legendary character, an absolute icon of the horror genre, and he deserves a decent remake. So maybe, just maybe, 2018 will be the year that Freddy once again makes it into audiences' nightmares.
And no, he's not a dated character. Definitely not, though some readers will think so. If anything he's one of the most timeless characters that horror has invented. Come on now- some freak who comes to get you in your dreams? That's one of the worst things imaginable as you just can't do anything about it. The more tired you get from trying to stay awake the more afraid you become- body and mind fatigued, stress levels through the roof and emotions at breaking point! Then when you finally drop off... BAM- that horrific hand and fedora are lurking.
The bed is supposed to be the safe place, remember? You dive under the covers and you're OK... protected from the bad things of this world. The Nightmare on Elm Street concept flips that on its head and makes it the worst place to be: the very epicentre of the horrors! Just picture yourself trying to get a good night's rest when all of a sudden a scarred menace materialises from your very own dream. There's no escaping it... except perhaps for those sleeping in plush velvet beds... Freddy doesn't like those!
So what would actually make this remake worth watching? What should the director be doing to ensure that Freddy doesn't come across as risible and naff as has happened in the past? Well the thing with all horror is that it's genre film, like genre fiction, and therefore is expected to contain certain generic features: haunting strings, stuff jumping out from nowhere, shaky cameras, abandoned buildings et cetera. The key is using them well.
For instance, we all know that whenever the camera turns its back (so to speak) on a room, that when it looks back again something horrible is highly likely to be there. Now a clever director plays on these kinds of audience expectations and keeps them on their toes.
A great example is in The Ring. Remember that scene at the beginning when the teenage girl opens the fridge door to get a snack and thereby fills the entire shot and blocks the background so we can't see what's coming? Everyone just assumes that there'll be a boogie man or something similarly shocking there when it shuts again, but when it actually happens... there's nothing but an empty hallway. This is the kind of intelligent approach to horror that's expected now and is definitely what's needed to make the new Nightmare on Elm Street movie a success.
So let's cross our fingers and hope that this time it all comes together and doesn't leave us just feeling annoyed and embarrassed at the poor handling and mistreatment of a truly great character.
