Freddy’s Big Break
Many years passed between my introduction to Freddy Krueger and my subsequent foray into the remainder of the franchise. I was a different horror fan then, no longer the fresh faced teenager who had discovered the knife-fingered maniac on a minuscule CRT TV, but a seasoned advocate of the genre. And, yet, somehow the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise had managed to elude me, or, maybe still, I had managed to elude it.
To me, Freddy Krueger was an intimidating presence. A shadowy force to be reckoned with. I suppose my fear was that after watching the sequels, despite what I knew that the character had become in pop culture, Freddy’s razor claws might be a tad less sharp.
The first passed by as expected: brilliant and just as powerful as it was before. The second was odd, disturbing at times, but slightly alienating when compared to the first. Then came Part 3.
A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors (1987) struck me immediately as a film that accomplished several impressive feats:
(1) It established Freddy as the anti-hero of the franchise.
(2) It added levity and excitement to an otherwise dreary world.
(3) It established a tone and direction for the franchise to follow.
The minute the film ended, I began to read about it. I saw Wes Craven’s name on the picture and could scarcely believe he might’ve written something so different from his first masterwork and yet a picture that worked so very well as an evolution of its themes given the landscape of cinema at the time.
As I read, I discovered the transition the film had gone through. The process that took Wes Craven’s original idea of Krueger haunting the cast and crew of the movie in the real world (an idea that may sound all too familiar to fans of the franchise), to that of Nancy Thompson searching for her father while teenage suicide ravaged the country. Craven’s script was then rewritten, being deemed too dark (it did feature Donald Thompson cutting off his own eyelids in the opening scene), by Frank Darabont and Chuck Russell. They infused a sense of fun, a degree of action and a more simplified story arc, altering Wes Craven’s original concept and creating a hybrid that played in the dark just as much as it did the light.
In concept, none of this should really work. How could all of these different voices, some with conflicting ideas of how the story should be told come together to form a coherent whole?
As a viewer, all of these years later, I attribute it to the lasting nature and burrowing methodology of the dream-like logic Wes Craven’s original film presented as its guiding principle. These are films where the most important developments take place inside of the mind. Logic is not required, neither is overt tonal consistency. In fact, all that matters, in my opinion, is that the audience is given characters to latch onto, believe and trust in.
A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors embodies several tonalities all at once, hopping between the truly horrific, the hilariously outlandish and the dramatically disturbing practically from scene to scene. Few sequences represent this balancing act more than that when Jennifer is killed as Freddy Krueger merges with the television screen she so desperately wants to appear on. The scene is upsetting and laughably outrageous, all the while utilizing Freddy Krueger as a formidable villain and larger-than-life entertainer, showcasing the balancing act the franchise would attempt to maintain through the rest of its run.
The words on the page once more reflect the dark natured horror that was present in the original, whilst infusing themselves with the eccentricity that audiences in the late 80s were responding to so voraciously. The absurdist nature of this sequence, and indeed the film as a whole, runs a constant risk of spoiling the picture to camp. However, the marriage of the creative voices involved and the manner in which Chuck Russell, Kevin Yagher and the effects team visualized it all on screen created an engrossing, undeniably lively exhibition that affects laughter as much as it does a fearful cringe, embodying the alliance of varying tonalities for which this franchise is so adored.
THE SCENE
Jennifer turns on the TV and sits down. She watches as the TV turns to static. She rises and adjusts it, smacking the TV several times. A hand grabs her own, emerging from the side of the TV. She struggles as Freddy’s gloved hand emerges from the screen and his head from the top of the set. Freddy lifts her and sinks back into the TV screen. He mocks her and then rams her into the screen, killing her and destroying the TV.
THE SCRIPT
THE SCREEN
The screenplay begins in a simple manner, without nuance: Jennifer ENTERS, turns on TV, sits down in chair. The film, in contrast, builds in time for the audience to enter her emotional headspace, holding on Jennifer as she unearths a discarded cigarette butt from the ash tray in front of her, lights it and then extinguishes it on her arm in an effort to stay awake. The moment is quiet and painful, yet the character treats the event with such a blasé attitude that the most striking element is how normal it is for her.
The script calls for canned laughter from an old sitcom. Then STATIC. Simple, effective and, again, cutting straight to the chase. When realized on screen, the filmmakers decided to have some fun with this notion, the TV landing on Zsa Zsa Gabor and Dick Cavett in the process of an interview. The script seemed to be interested in building tension, keeping the moment quiet and serious until the apex of outlandish transformation. The film, on the other hand, decided that a bit of frivolity may well help the event land better and more effectively in the end.
Extending the introduction to this sequence also provides the ability to cut back and forth between Jennifer and the screen, reminding viewers of the all-too-familiar feeling of dozing off late at night while watching something inconsequential on TV. She continuously nods off and catches herself, allowing the film to transition seamlessly into the dream world without the audience’s or Jennifer’s awareness. An awareness that comes roaring to life when Freddy, inhabiting Dick Cavett shouts at a rather surprised Gabor: “Who gives a fuck what you think?”
Static overtakes the image and the film returns to the layout of the screenplay: She gets up and tries to adjust the set. In the film, the soundscape reflects the fear she undoubtedly feels as moans and stifled screams are interwoven into the harsh, broken hum of the static emitting from the set. Again, despite the silliness of Dick Cavett’s outburst seconds before, the film reattains a sense of mounting dread. Then:
Her hand is grabbed by a hand THAT COMES OUT OF THE SIDE OF THE TV.
The screenplay doesn’t mention the look, or feel of this moment, only capitalizes the letters in a clear effort to announce its importance – the drama of its intended impact. In the film, not one, but two arms emerge from either side of the television, comprised of wires and electrical components, like that of a haphazard, makeshift robot. Both hands are equipped with extended knife-like claws, reminiscent of Krueger’s iconic glove. They grab Jennifer and raise her to the screen. The screenplay deviates a bit from this sequence of events, providing Jennifer time to digest what’s happening: Startled. Jennifer tries to move away. No dice.
The screenplay continues to be incredibly straight-forward, unfeeling in a sort of alien way. The incorporation of the phrase “no dice” suggests an apathetic omniscient voice, which causes the words to feel cold and cruel. Also, the script seemed to call for the limbs to more closely resemble Freddy, saying a second hand – this one RAZORED – comes out of the screen itself. Instead, the film opts to have Freddy merge with the TV rather than be intact inside of it, streamlining the sequence and playing more into the limitlessness of the dream world than the aforementioned notion. This carries through as the scene evolves and Freddy makes himself known:
Freddie’s head stretches out from the top of the set, wearing the ‘rabbit ears’ of its antenna like some horrible insect.
The film follows this very closely, showing Freddy’s face pushing up through the top of the set as though attempting to emerge from a cocoon. His skin is visible through a thin, translucent veneer, the TV antenna appearing insect-like as the script implies. The image is striking and disturbing, not only because of the odd way in which the man has melded with the everyday electronic, but due to the fact that his ability in the dream world truly does have no bounds. The script has the monster utter the familiar phrase:
Heeeerrrrreee’sss Freddie!
The film, however, plays against Jennifer’s storyline and deeper desires, cruelly mocking her failure to achieve her life’s ambition before the moment of her death:
“This is it Jennifer, your big break in TV!”
While being the type of one-liner Freddy Krueger would become famous for, this line also has dramatic implications that heighten the tension and tragedy of an otherwise preposterous situation. The script elongates this sequence, calling for Freddy to actually reemerge into the TV and appear on the screen once more. The script describes the motion as like some huge ugly fish diving. Instead, the film event occurs with lightning speed, understanding that effects like these are best shown in small bursts and carried out with expedience. The emotional impact is therefore heightened and the seams are more difficult to discern.
The script call’s for Freddy’s final taunt to be:
We’ve got a wonderful show for you tonight, Jennifer! ‘Lights out’!
The line is a tad clunky and a bit more reminiscent of an aloof game show host rather than a punishing killer who is relishing in his deed. Robert Englund famously improvised the line which actually appears in the film. A fittingly vulgar sendoff, once more encompassing both the character’s proclivity toward quips and his desire to remind the young victims of the life he is stripping from them (not to mention being suitably ridiculous):
“Welcome to Prime Time, bitch!”
The screenplay wraps up the sequence in a fittingly disturbing manner, describing not only the simple series of events but providing more specific context into exactly how the character is dispatched:
With that, he RAMS her head like a bettering ram straight into the screen, shattering her skull and the thick glass with a ringing blow and implosion of brain, tube and phosphors.
Given the admitted silliness of the murder, the grotesqueness of that description is fairly shocking. The film realizes this with blunt force, slamming Jennifer into the glass with a myriad of explosive bursts and pops, bringing those words to upsetting life. The screenplay continues:
The girl’s legs kick, then go limp. The corpse falls still, half in, half out of the hissing, sparking set.
When she’s found, Jennifer hangs limply from the broken television mounted on the wall. The scene leaves us in a quiet, disturbed place, a moment of pain and confusion similar to how it began minutes before when Jennifer was scalding her skin with the lit end of a used cigarette to avoid falling asleep. Just as the orderly who discovers Jennifer’s limp, hanging corpse, the audience is left in awe and terror of the immeasurable capabilities and gruesome propensities of the villain they will never be able to escape.
THE BLOODY CONCLUSION
I avoided the Nightmare franchise as a whole for many years, fearful that Freddy’s ability to invade my nightmares might be lessened a bit with each subsequent sequel. However, what I discovered was a fascinating journey into those dreams and what it is that makes Freddy Krueger an icon of horror.
Wes Craven’s original intent was to evolve his icon, not simply reiterate his tale. The original film is a masterpiece of terror, an untouchable work of art that will never be diminished. However, inside of that concept are the seeds of exploration, the notion of a serial killer inside of your mind, one that dwells where your imagination is most untethered and, therefore, most vulnerable. To exist in that space is to inherently lose your humanity, so it stands to reason, the longer he’s there, the more insane (hell, the more crazed) that soul might become.
A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors did a great deal to establish the nature of the franchise, to infuse the fantastical while still maintaining dread and danger – the balance between the light and the dark – which became the heart of what made the films popular. Moreover, this odd confluence of conflicting stylistic and emotional tones was brought about by several independent creative ideas that when melded together created one of the most beloved films in an altogether beloved franchise.
In concept, the idea of a TV coming to life to kill a teenager doesn’t sound all that frightening. In fact, it doesn’t sound like it should work at all. Still, sometimes its the strange, outside of the box ideas that shouldn’t work that do, especially when logic is discarded for the sensibility of dreams.
In an interview conducted by Gwynne Watkins, for Yahoo Entertainment, published on October 30, 2015 titled ‘Freddy’s Fed: The Making of the Freakiest, Most Freudian ‘Nightmare on Elm Street’ Scene Ever’ (Found here), Kevin Yagher recounts how he landed the effects position on the film as a young, inexperienced artist:
“I pitched to them, ‘Listen, I’ll do the movie, but I want to do all the effects.’ And they were stupid enough to do it.”
A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors is all about taking risks, exploring opportunities and not allowing logic to get in the way. For, once you alter your way of thinking (much like I did when I finally decided to explore this franchise) you open the door to a whole new avenue of creative possibility.
It’s a world that’s terrifying and yet inviting, one Freddy Krueger allows us to explore and revel in – exercising those fears, wants and desires whilst witnessing others be exercised of them. A place we’re simultaneously repulsed by, but drawn to, and one Krueger will never fail to invade.
Perhaps that’s why Wes Craven originally pitched this as a movie where Freddy Krueger goes after those filmmakers who were attempting to make a movie about him. Even then, I suppose, the world wanted at least some limits on their nightmares.
And, if you’re a fan of the franchise, you know exactly how well that worked out for them.
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987) Written by Wes Craven and Bruce Wagner and Frank Darabont & Chuck Russell
Directed by Chuck Russell
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