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The Cardigan-sploitation of A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4!

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I recently attended Screamfest’s 30th Anniversary screening of A Nightmare on Elm Street 4 at Hollywood’s famed Chinese Theatre, and to say it was amazing would be an understatement. The whole cast was there, director Renny Harlin and legendary producer Bob Shaye were both there, and a fun Q&A with everyone followed the film. Sitting in the moderately-sized – but PACKED – theatre, watching the film with the stars of the film – well, that’s just a dream come true for any horror fan.

It’s always fun watching a horror film you’ve only ever seen on VHS or DVD up on the big screen. You seem to notice things you never really took note of before. For example, in A Nightmare on Elm Street 4, during the classroom scene where Freddy sucks all the air out of Toy Newkirk’s asthmatic little body, I always thought Robert Englund actually peeled the apple (which had been sitting on the desk) using a real bladed-glove. However, seeing it play out 50 feet wide, I was able to see that the apple was actually pre-peeled and simply stuck back together. It was a small thing, but my insides still went “whoa, cool.” Continue reading The Cardigan-sploitation of A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4! →

13 Days of Sequels

13 Days of Sequels: A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 2

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With 13 Days of Sequels I’ll be reviewing horror sequels every weekday for the last two weeks of October. You can view all entries HERE.

It’s funny how you can watch a movie ten or twenty times – blindly enjoying it more and more with each viewing – before you start picking up on certain stuff. When I re-watched A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge this past weekend, I came to realize two pretty big things.

Firstly, the whole movie is really bizarre, to the point where I almost think it’s intended to play as a legit horror-comedy, like Student Bodies or Evil Dead II – not “so bad it’s funny”, but a horror movie with an intentional comedic streak. And no, I’m not talking about the whole gay subtext thing – while that does illicit a few chuckles, I actually really like it as a running theme, even in its not-so-subtle read between the (very obvious) lines approach. It gives the movie layers.

No, the oddness I’m talking about is much more consciously goofy. Continue reading 13 Days of Sequels: A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 2 →

13 Days of Sequels

13 Days of Sequels: SLEEPAWAY CAMP II

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With 13 Days of Sequels I’ll be reviewing horror sequels every weekday for the last two weeks of October. You can view all entries HERE.

Thanks in part to the massive success of Friday the 13th, the early ’80s saw a surge in horror movies set around the campfire, lovingly known as “backwoods slashers”. The Burning, Mother’s Day, Madman, Don’t Go in the Woods…Alone!, Just Before Dawn, The Forest, The Final Terror, and The Prey were all released before the decade had even reached its halfway point. The trend would all but dry up by the end of the ’80s, the only real notable exceptions being the franchises that had fostered the sub-genre and had outlived the random copycats.

One of those enduring films was Sleepaway Camp, the cult shocker from 1983 that became a surprise success (making $11M off its $350K budget) thanks largely in part to its bizarre climax – which is still being talked about today. Continue reading 13 Days of Sequels: SLEEPAWAY CAMP II →

horror nerd of the month, Nightmare on Elm Street

HORROR NERD OF THE MONTH — Sheila!

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The A Nightmare on Elm Street series is no stranger to nerdy characters (Will the Wizard Master, anyone?), but what with it being Black History Month and Women in Horror Month, Camera Viscera’s February HORROR NERD OF THE MONTH was a no brainer: Sheila, from A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master. And brother, what a geek! Continue reading HORROR NERD OF THE MONTH — Sheila! →

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Not-so-awful Sequels! (Part One)

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Hollywood gets a bad rap. People think of it as this horrible money machine, but the truth is Hollywood has nothing but a filmmaker’s best interest in mind. Believe it or not, producers and financiers actually care about creativity and artistic vision and want nothing more than to protect the filmmaker’s creation, and they want to encourage originality by supporting new ideas. Hollywood is about integrity and respect.

No, I’m only kidding. Hollywood is a bloated, greedy monster that cares only about how much money a film makes and absolutely nothing else. And if a film can somehow keep making boatloads of money years after its been released, even better! But how do you do that? Make it a franchise. There are no better cash-cows than horror franchises. Perhaps you’ve heard New Line Cinema referred to as “The House that Freddy Built“, due to the popularity of the A Nightmare on Elm Street series. And how do you build a house? Money. Lots of money. Continue reading Not-so-awful Sequels! (Part One) →