A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge (1985)

“You’re all my children now!”

As you know instantly by the very fact that I’m reviewing this, I’m going to be going through all of these films in order, although I’ll only be watching one every now and again, so if you’re not a fan, fear not: there will be plenty of other films reviewed, along with the usual telly stuff.

Glad that’s sorted. Anyway, this film is a bit rubbish, isn’t it? It has all of the low budget, dodgy dialogue and ropey acting of its predecessor, but with none of the genuine scares and, yes, genius of its predecessor. This is largely, I suspect, because of the conspicuous absence of Wes Craven.

The main problem is that what Freddy’s doing just isn’t as scary. He doesn’t want to horribly kill our main protagonist, Jesse, but to use him to exact his “revenge” in an unspecified manner. There’s a big gory bloodbath towards the end, but no scary set pieces. Here’s no suspense. There are no real shocks. Also, the 80s soundtrack is impossible to take seriously in what is supposed to be a scary film. We get lots of dull melodrama (the cartoon authoritarian father is just silly), lots of obvious ketchup and lots of ‘80s suburban décor, but not the scares we were hoping for.

I mentioned this film in the pub about a week after watching it, and I’m told the later films are better than this. I hope so.