A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989)

A Nightmare On Elm Street 5: The Dream Child

Written by John Skipp, Craig Spector & Leslie Bohem
Directed by Stephen Hopkins

When you watch Nightmare 5 you get the sense that 'they' are trying to reintroduce the dark atmosphere of the original - by making a movie that's full of old, broken down castle-esque asylums, churches and labyrnths. It's quite a departure from anything we've seen before, and one that would be welcome if the movie wasn't quite so rubbish.

The film has some pretty clever ideas - such as Freddy returning by entering into an unborn childs dreams (and turning said child against his mother-to-be) and Alice, our returning protaganist from the previous film has to do battle with him again, all the while learning even more of Freddy's backstory.

That's the thing about this film - so much of it is concerned with revealing how Freddy came to be (I mean literally, being the son of a nun who was raped by 100 lunatics) demistifies the character a little. Before he was this guy we knew very little about - Child murderer who was burned to death by a group of lynch-mob parents. Turning him into this monster from birth certainly removes from the character.

So anyway, since the last film Alice has made some new friends. Like before they have no real depth and are just one-note characters. In pretty much each case that 'one note' will play into how they die (the comic book nerd does battle against a musclular 'Super-Freddy' and is then turned into paper and diced up. Yeah... they musta made him a comic nerd just to do that gag). The characters don't feel organic anymore, they're just there to be Freddy-Fodder, and that just makes you root for Fred even more. Krueger is still the star of the show, cracking-wise and being pretty much the only entertaining thing about this movie. Englund does a great job at being the showman - you can't fault his performance. I just wish everyone involved had let Freddy be a mysterious, background monster like before. But we're passed the point of no return on that one.

I don't really have much to say about this one - it will always be remembered for being very typical, and as such it's difficult to think of anything about it that stands out. This film just is, and it's pretty dull apart from Englund. So...

Onto Freddys Dead: The Final Nightmare (you liars!)