A Nightmare on Elm Street (film, 1984)

Tina Gray ( Amanda Weiss ) has the same nightmare all the time, in which she walks through a deserted boiler room, and then a certain person ( Robert Inglund ) with a burnt face, in a dirty striped sweater, with a glove on his right hand, equipped with blades on fingers trying to kill her. She tells this to her friend Nancy ( Heather Lanzhenkamp ), and it turns out that she is haunted by the same nightmare.

Soon, Nancy, her boyfriend Glen Lantz ( Johnny Depp ) and Tina's boyfriend Rod Llane ( Hsu Garcia ) decide to spend the night at Tina's house because her mother left, and the girl is now afraid to sleep alone because of her dreams. Tina had a dream that night that a man with a burnt face was attacking her in the backyard of her house. However, the cuts that he inflicts with the gloves blades appear on the sleeping Tina in reality, and she dies. The clan that was lying next to her only saw how bloody cuts appear on Tina's body.

Suspicion of murder falls on Rod, and he is arrested. Meanwhile, Nancy after this night decides to go to school (although her mother is against it), but at one of the lessons she falls asleep and in a dream ends up in the boiler room, where that terrible person appears chasing the girl. Nancy manages to wake up, putting his hand to a red-hot pipe - the pain of a burn is so real that she wakes up. Having taken leave from school, on the way home she notices a burn mark on her hand.

Nancy decides to speak with Rod, who is in the police station, and finds out that the young man had the same dream as she and Tina, and also learns about cuts that appeared on Tina's body. Later, lying at home in the bathtub, she falls asleep again, and at first a gloved hand with blades reaches for her from the foam, and then the bottom suddenly disappears near the bathtub, and Nancy almost drowns. Late in the evening, Glen, who lives in the opposite house, makes his way to her bedroom, and Nancy asks him to follow her while she sleeps. In a dream, she goes to Rod and sees a mysterious stranger enter the cell to a sleeping young man, and then this stranger again attacks Nancy, but she again manages to wake up, as the alarm goes off. When she wakes up, she and Glen immediately go to the police station, but while Nancy is trying to be allowed to come to Rod, a sheet is pulled around his neck with a stranglehold and strangling him. In this case, everything looks as if Rod hanged himself.

After the funeral of Rod and Tina, mother Nancy Marge ( Roni Blackley ) decides to take her daughter to a sleep disorder clinic, where Nancy is artificially put to sleep. However, during the session, she undergoes another bout of nightmare and, when she is awakened, finds four bloody cuts on her arm, one of her locks of hair turns gray, and in the hands of Nancy is the hat of that same person. Nancy says she "ripped her off his head during the fight." On the lining of the hat there is a label: " Fred Krueger ." She tries to find out from Marge who she is, but she refuses to speak, saying only that the person who is chasing Nancy in dreams cannot be Krueger, because he is dead. Enraged by her mother’s disbelief, Nancy leaves home to meet with Glen, who, during a walk, tells her about a special method of controlling sleep - when it becomes completely scary, you need to convince yourself that what is happening around you is just a dream, try to transform your dream into a conscious one .

When Nancy returns home, he sees the bars on the windows installed at the request of her mother. Marge takes Nancy to the basement, where from a dormant heating stove he takes out a bundle with a glove with blades and says that Fred Krueger was a bloody murderer. He lured his victims to the old boiler room, where he worked as a watchman, and killed. Kruger was arrested 13 years ago, but due to a bureaucratic error he was released for lack of evidence. Then the angry parents of the murdered children, among whom were the parents of Nancy and her friends, locked Kruger in the boiler room and burned him alive. Marge grabbed the glove with her as a trophy. Nancy realizes that Kruger’s spirit now avenges through dreams the children of the parents of his murdered. Having been awake for more than five days, Nancy decides to get Kruger out of sleep, as she did with a hat: in a dream she will cling to him, and Glen, who will be on duty next to him, will wake her, and then she will drag Kruger into reality, neutralize and transfer to the police . However, at the scheduled hour, Nancy cannot leave the house to go after Glen, since the drunk Marge does not give her the door key. Nancy calls Glen to come to her at midnight, but he falls asleep in his house ahead of time, and Krueger brutally kills him.

Being at the limit, Nancy calls his father Donald ( John Saxon ), who is divorced from Marge, tells him about Krueger and asks at the specified time to break into their house. Although the father does not particularly believe the daughter’s words, he asks his assistant to look after her house and let her know if something strange happens. Meanwhile, Nancy prepares to meet her nightmare and sets traps everywhere in the house. She manages to grab Kruger in her dream and wake up at the alarm, pulling Fred out of sleep into the real world. Nancy lures him into traps, and then her father runs to her aid. She and Nancy see Kruger grab the drunk Marge, fall through the bed with her and disappear. Nancy's stunned father leaves the room. At this time, Kruger crawls out of bed, but Nancy says that he is just a dream, and Freddy disappears.

A sunny day is approaching, Nancy is standing on the threshold of her house with her mother. Glen came with her along with Tina and Rod. But when Nancy gets into the car, she is trapped: the windows of the car close by themselves and she takes all four friends away to Kruger’s laughter. At the same time, Marge does not react to this at all, but only smiles. Then Kruger’s hand breaks the inside of the window in the front door and drags Nancy’s mother inside.

Project Development

One day, Wes Craven read an article in a local Los Angeles Times newspaper about several teenagers from Cambodia who had such terrible dreams that they refused to sleep. ^[12] Following their doctor’s instructions, their parents began to give children special medicines, but soon the children died one after the other from the consequences of nightmares ^[13] . It was then that Craven took up writing the script. Although in reality the cause of the death of the children was heart attacks against the background of general depletion of the body, in the script their nightmares were explained by the fact that a very scary man was pursuing them in his dreams and trying to kill ^[14] . The first question arose: “What should I call him?” Without thinking twice, Craven gave the maniac the name of the man who terrorized him in the lower grades. The prototype (at least the character of the villain) was a homeless man who scared Craven in his childhood. Initially, Krueger conceived as a typical silent killer like Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees . From the very beginning, Craven wrote the script with the idea that Kruger is not only a killer maniac, but also a pedophile. However, at that time, a scandal broke out in California with a real pedophile, and the bosses of the studio decided that they should not aggravate the wounds of the victims and their relatives with a reminder of this tragedy. Remembering the choice of the name of the picture, Craven immediately mentions the death of John F. Kennedy, who was killed on November 22, 1963 in Dallas, Texas, on Elm Street ^[15] .

Script

Wes Craven began work on the script in 1981 after completing the filming of Swamp Creature . Craven offered the idea of ​​the film to several studios, but received rejections for various reasons. The first interest was shown by Walt Disney Productions, but management demanded a softening of the material in order to focus on children's and teenage audiences. Then Wes Craven himself refused. Paramount Pictures also expressed a desire to work on the project, but ultimately refused, as the concept was similar to the 1984 film “ Flight from Sleep ”. Craven took the failure of the studios to heart - later he hung all the letters in a frame on the wall of his office. As a result, a small independent studio “New Line Cinema”, which before that was engaged only in distribution of films, took up the shooting of the picture.

Casting

The main contender for the role of Freddy Krueger was actor David Warner ^[16] . Makeup tests have already been done ^[17] , when it turned out that the shooting schedule does not allow Warner to take on the role. At the initial stage, the search for replacement was difficult. “I couldn’t find an actor for the role of Freddy Krueger who posed danger,” Craven recalls. “Everyone looked too calm and full of sympathy with the children. Then Robert Inglund came to the test. He was not as tall as I wanted, and he had such a childish facial expression, but I was struck by his desire to penetrate into the dark depths of his own consciousness. Robert understood Freddy. ” ^[18] To transform to listening, the actor opened his eyelids with tobacco ash and combed his hair back. “I looked weird. I sat across from Wes and listened to him. He was a high educated college graduate. I took all kinds of poses, imitating Klas Kinsky - that's how the tests went. " Inglund agreed to the role, since it was the only project at that time that fit into his schedule during the break of filming of the series “ V ” ^[18] .

According to Craven, for the role of Nancy Thompson, he was looking for an actress of "non-Hollywood appearance," and Heather Langenkamp ideally suited these requirements ^[19] . Lanzhenkamp got the role, bypassing more than 200 actresses, among whom were Demi Moore , Jennifer Gray , Tracy Gold and Courtney Cox ^[20] . The last Craven a few years later removed in his famous quadrology " Scream " ^[21] . At that time, Heather appeared in several commercials and television films. The actress decided to take a break from studying at Stanford and devote herself to an acting career ^[18] . Subsequently, she starred in two parts of the franchise - " A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Sleep Warriors " and " A Nightmare on Elm Street 7: A New Nightmare ."

Johnny Depp made his film debut as Glen, a classmate and lover of Nancy. Depp came to audition for the company with his friend - actor Jack Earl Haley, who will play Freddy Krueger in a remake of 2010 ^[19] . Trusting his intuition, director Wes Craven risked entrusting one of the main roles to a guy who had no acting experience, and was surprised at how freely he stood in front of the camera. Charlie Sheen claimed the role of Glen, but the studio could not pay him the fee he wanted ^[18] . The nominations of John Cusack , Kiefer Sutherland , Nicholas Cage, and Sea Thomas Howell were also considered . The role of Rod Lane was played by actor Hsu Garcia, taking the pseudonym Nick Corry. ^[22] In the scene at the medical clinic, where Nancy's hair turns gray, a nurse appears - she was played by Craven’s second wife, Mimi ^[23] .

Shooting Period

This was the first major project of the New Line Cinema company. In the midst of filming, the studio found itself in a financial crisis. Distributors refused to finance the picture - the cast and crew were filmed for almost two weeks, without receiving a cent. " New Line Cinema " was then on the verge of bankruptcy. But no one left the set, and the film was shot in 32 days ^[24] . It was immediately agreed that the picture would be low budget. The only hope that the company will continue to exist is the success of the film. And the picture paid off. The film raised about $ 25 million - an unprecedented success for low-budget films. The picture has become so successful that it still makes a profit for its creators - 7 sequels were shot, one television series, a large number of comics, books, toys and other products were released; in 2010 a remake of the film was shot ^[25] . The company “ New Line ” is jokingly called the “house that Freddy built” ^[26] . Craven helped director Sean Cunningham shoot the movie Friday the 13th , and Cunningham directed several episodes of The Nightmare on Elm Street.

Location

The facade of Tina’s house was Mansion No. 620 on Milwood Avenue . Interestingly, the backyard, on which Kruger chases Tina, is indeed located on the opposite side of the house. The interior scenes, in particular Tina’s room, were shot in specially constructed scenery. The exteriors of the houses of Nancy and Glen were filmed on a street called “ Genesee Avenue ”. Interestingly, the famous mansion in reality has the same number as the cinematic - No. 1428 (the interior of the Thompson was also rented in this house). The house number used as the facade of the Lantsov family house is No. 1419. This street is adjacent to the famous Sunset Boulevard . The exterior of the police station was filmed from one of the Los Angeles libraries - “Cahuenga Branch”. The prison cell was shot in the scenery. The bridge on which Glen and Nancy discuss sleeping techniques was filmed on Venice Beach in Los Angeles .

The facade of Springwood High School was the real John Marshall High, and the interiors were filmed at John Burroughs Middle. It's funny that the scene in which Nancy walks along the school corridor in search of Tina is not shot exactly like the corridors of the school where the shooting took place: Nancy leaves the English office (No. 104) and slowly walks along the corridor, gradually accelerating. In the next frame, she runs around the corner and encounters the school duty officer. If we look at the corridor, then it is in a straight line behind the actors is the very cabinet from which Nancy came out. Thus, according to the plot, the heroine moved with the letter “P”: from the English lesson to the stairs leading to the basement, although in fact the shooting took place in one long straight corridor. While the basement staircase was filmed at the opposite end of the corridor. The secretary’s office, located in front of the headmaster’s office, was used to shoot the lobby of the police station, where Nancy was talking with her father, Lieutenant Thompson. The office of the director became the lieutenant’s office. Сцены с котельной, а также коридор из кошмара Тины в начале фильма снимали в тюрьме «Lincoln Heights».

Грим и дизайн

По замыслу режиссёра Фредди должен был сниматься в плаще, но из-за небольшой неразберихи на съёмочной площадке плащ был утерян. Положение спас красно-зелёный полосатый свитер, принадлежавший одному из осветителей. Этот свитер был подарен осветителю его невестой, связавшей его как подарок к свадьбе. Надетый на главного героя, свитер с его сочетанием цветов и маской главного героя являл настолько жуткое сочетание, что был оставлен в фильме и далее. Крэйвен аргументирует выбор так: «Я где-то читал, что это — самое трудноусваиваемое для человеческого глаза сочетание цветов».

Спецэффекты

Для съёмок смерти Тины, в которой тело девушки летает по комнате и движется по стенам и потолку, построили специальную вращающуюся декорацию — когда комната вращалась, актриса переползала на следующую стену. Камера была закреплена на одной стене и следовала за актрисой по мере её движения вместе с комнатой. Оператор был привязан к креслу, что позволяло ему управлять камерой во время вращения декорации. Интересно, что в сцене, когда Тина тянется с потолка к Роду, сидящему на полу, на самом деле актёр Хсу Гарсия висел вверх ногами, а его волосы были специально уложены, чтобы они не свисали. Эффект перевёрнутой комнаты был настолько потрясающим, что у актрисы Аманды Уайсс, сыгравшей Тину, практически сразу же начались сильные приступы головокружения. Вдохновением для съёмок послужил фильм 1951 года « Королевская свадьба » («Royal Wedding») — первый фильм в истории кино, снятый с использованием вращающихся декораций.

Кровавый фонтан из кровати Глена снимали в той же вращающейся декорации, что и смерть Тины. Однако здесь группа столкнулась с куда большими трудностями — снять сцену необходимо было с одного раза. Декорации перевернули вверх ногами так, что кровать оказалась на потолке. Затем включили сильный насос, с помощью которого окрашенная вода не просто выливалась, а била под напором — как и показано в фильме. Однако в конце концов воды оказалось так много, что съёмочная группа, сохранявшая равновесие декорации, не смогла более удерживать её, как надо: в итоге часть воды вылилась через окно на членов съёмочной группы. Вода намочила провода и человека, управляющего насосом, ударило током.

Никто точно не знает, что же было использовано для создания эффекта «затягивающих ступенек» в сцене, когда Нэнси не может подняться по лестнице. Актриса говорит, что «это был грибной суп или что-то вроде того», Крейвен — «овсяная каша», а Жак Эткин утверждает, что в этой сцене использовали жидкое тесто. Во всяком случае, единой версии не существует.

Ванна Нэнси была установлена над бассейном. Во время съёмок актриса Хизер Ландженкамп провела в этой ванне 12 часов, как и актёр Джим Дойл — дублёр Фредди (а точнее, его правой руки).

Во время съёмок было использовано 500 галлонов (примерно 2273,05 литра) заменителя крови.

Музыку к фильму написал композитор Чарльз Бернштайн ( англ. Charles Bernstein ) ^[27] :

В фильме также звучала песня «Nightmare (Just A Dream)» в исполнении группы 213 ^[28] . Официально композиция не издавалась, но в Интернете можно найти версии, вырезанные из фильма ^[29] .

Расширенные и альтернативные сцены

• Глен, Тина и Нэнси слышат странный звук на заднем дворе. В этой версии присутствуют несколько вырезанных диалогов, а также мимика и интонации актёров немного отличаются от финальной версии.
• Крюгер машет на прощание (Тине или Роду) сразу после того, как убивает девушку, и в комнату врываются Глен и Нэнси.
• В сцене смерти Тины присутствуют альтернативные ракурсы и кровавые подробности.
• Нэнси приходит навестить Рода в тюрьме — эта сцена немного отличается от той, что вошла в финальную версию интонациями, мимикой и репликами актёров.
• Прямо перед смертью Рода Нэнси и Глен прибегают в полицейский участок, где у Нэнси и лейтенанта Томпсона вновь происходит напряжённый разговор.
• Мардж рассказывает Нэнси всю правду о Крюгере в подвале их дома. Мардж говорит, что у Нэнси, Тины, Рода и Глена были старшие братья и/или сёстры ^[30] .
• In the scene of Glen's death, after the bloody fountain ends up pouring out of bed, the young man’s body emerges from the hole into which he was sucked, and then it falls lifelessly onto the bed.
• When Freddy comes out of bed Marge, and Nancy turns his back to him before going out the door, Nancy pronounces the abusive “fuck off!” Instead of the usual abusive “you are nothing!” (“You are shit! ").

Alternative finals

Initially, Craven wanted the film to end well - Nancy realizes that everything that happened to her is just a dream. However, the head of New Line Cinema , Bob Shay, insisted on a bad end. As a result, several versions of the finale were shot:

The rental version of the film included the following ending: Nancy gets into the car to her friends, the “striped” roof rises, the car takes the guys away, Marge sees the children singing the count, and then Kruger pulls her into the house through the window.

Alternative finals:

1. Nancy gets into the car with friends, they leave, Marge sees the children singing the count, and then Krueger pulls her into the house through the window. ^[31]
2. Nancy gets into the car with friends, they leave, Marge sees the children singing the count, and the film ends. ^[32]
3. Nancy gets into the car with his friends, the “striped” roof rises, the car takes the guys away, Krueger pulls Marge into the house through the window, the children sing the count, Freddy drives the car. ^[33]

Box office fees

The world premiere of the picture took place on November 9, 1984 in 165 US cinemas ^[1] . In the premiere weekend, the film raised $ 1,271,000 with a budget of $ 1.8 million ^[4] . Total fees in the United States amounted to $ 25 504 513 ^[1] . The film was also released in Europe, Canada and Australia ^[34] .

Criticism

Some critics define the film's stylistic identity as a teenage mystical horror film ^[35] . According to the same critic, the Nightmare series on Elm Street is more original than the other popular series, Friday the 13th . However, the director failed to reach the end of the film, shown at the beginning and realized during the film, the duality of the events of the picture, expressed in a combination of showing events in a dream and in reality ^[35] . All subsequent parts of the series are inferior to the original in terms of subtlety and mastery of the main characters' dreams on the screen.

Rewards

The fourth channel of British television conducted a survey among viewers and ranked the worst movies in the history of cinema. Experts prepared a list of one hundred applicants, and the audience for several weeks voted for the scariest movie scene. “A Nightmare on Elm Street” (1984) - the first appearance of Freddy Krueger - entered the top ten.

Movie on video

In America, the film was first released for home video in early 1985 by Media Home Entertainment on LaserDisc and VHS . The picture was first published on DVD in 1999 - first as part of a collector's edition with all the sequels and bonus discs released at that time - and later separately. In 2006, a special 2-disk edition of the picture was released in the Infinifilm series with numerous films about filming, interviews with the creators of the picture, alternative finals and audio commentaries. Wes Craven noted that in the original version of the film, “kinolap” was allowed - when Nancy asks Glen to follow her while she is sleeping, she turns off the lamp by the bed before going to bed. However, when the girl wakes up, the light is on. On the 2006 DVD, the scene was darkened.

On April 13, 2010, Warner Home Video released its first Blu-ray movie ^[36] . All bonuses from the special edition of 2006, as well as 6 sequels filmed between 1985 and 1994, were placed on the disk ^[37] . The new DVD collection went on sale that day ^[38] .

In the 1980s in the USSR and in the 1990s in Russia, the film was dubbed from Western licensed videos and laser records to underground video tapes translated by Leonid Volodarsky under the title “A Nightmare on Elm Street”, as well as Vasily Gorchakov , Andrei Gavrilov and others. In 1993, the film was released in the Russian film distribution and video distribution . The tapes were shown in voiceover two-voice translation. Female roles were voiced by Natalya Varley . The premiere of the film on DVD took place in the summer of 2008, when the Central Partnership and Cinema Trade companies began to release the entire series on licensed discs for the 5th region. Later, a regional edition with a black cover was released, as well as a two-disc edition of the entire series ^{[39] [40]} In addition, there is a 7-disk edition of the series under one cover ^[41] . The box also had a booklet in Russian with information about making films.

Remake

In 2010, a remake of "A Nightmare on Elm Street" was released with Jackie Earle Haley starring Freddy Krueger . The producer of the picture was Michael Bay, staged a picture by Samuel Beyer according to the script of Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer. It was originally planned that the remake will restart the franchise, but the box office of the film did not live up to expectations and the continuation was canceled.

Toys

New Line has released a large number of toys dedicated to the film.

Novelties

• A Nightmare on Elm Street on the Internet Movie Database
• “A Nightmare on Elm Street” on allmovie
• A Nightmare on Elm Street on Box Office Mojo
• “A Nightmare on Elm Street” on the Rotten Tomatoes website
• “A Nightmare on Elm Street” on the Metacritic website
• A Nightmare on Elm Street on The Nightmare On Elm Street Companion
• Review of the film "A Nightmare on Elm Street" on the AMOVE website