Ghostbusters: Answer the Call

Poor writing exceeds every larger discussion or theme in film: sociology, politics, satire, escapism, form, style. Also is gender, as the 2016 “Ghostbusters: Answer the Call” remake clearly showcases. Director Paul Fieg’s attempt on the ghost comedy is theoretically perceptive, a feminist take on a beloved classic, casting Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones as the ones with the proton packs used to shoot and capture all kinds of ghosts.

John Serba stated in his review, “But Feig and Katie Dippold's screenplay is a slipshod mess of forgettable gags tossed into a generic plot puffed up with unremarkable special effects. It's also besieged with references to the 1984 film, which backfire, because including them doesn't stoke nostalgia as much as it begs unfavorable comparison. To be clear, nobody watches the original for its depth of character - Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis were little more than charismatic, goofball conduits for witty and quotable catchphrases. Wiig, McCarthy, McKinnon and Jones look like they're making up the characters on the fly as they recite weary cliches. "Say hello to my little friend!" Wiig half-heartedly yells as she blasts the bejeezus out of a CGI ghost, in a scene I remember only because I was taking notes.”

Wiig plays Erin Gilbert, a physicist insulted in the University for her Research in the supernatural. She gets back together with her old friend Abby Yates, played by McCarthy, after they see a complete ghostly occurrence. Erin, somewhat doubtful except when she isn’t, finds physical proof of the psychic, as she gets it, when a ghost in New York City’s Aldridge Mansion purges green slime in her face. If that’s not enough, the slime is repeated twice more in the first act, which is like the movie’s slim budget went over the salaries of its writers.

Serba said, “McCarthy and Wiig's bland turns as literally buttoned-up eggheads are eclipsed by current "Saturday Night Live" cast member McKinnon, whose Jillian Holtzmann is a spunky, punk-haired inventress in omnipresent goggles. Rejected by institutions both legit and rinky-dink, the trio pass on an old Manhattan firehouse - it's $21,000 per month to rent! - and set up their gear above a Chinese restaurant, fielding calls for unearthly activity.” They recruit a completely sociable fourth member in Jones’ former subway clerk Patty Tolan, as well as some disgrace, which creates jokes about stupid internet commenters – a reference to the backlash Feig got when announcing an all-female “Ghostbusters” cast.

Feig has a reputation for making strong female comedies with firm narratives and effective jokes – Wigg in “Bridesmades,” McCarthy’s “The Heat” and “Spy,” more right comparisons than the ’84 “Ghostbusters.” Maybe I should say that the director’s weakest attempt isn’t his original idea. This remake – not a sequel or a prequel, it’s a complete copy, set in its own time where Bill Murray plays a completely different character – hesitates when it should effervesce. Serba said, “The direction is sloppy: Scenes dawdle and dilly-dally when they should poke and jab; there's little narrative flow or suspense as the Ghostbusters zap glowing Satanic gargoyles and evil-spirit-possessed parade balloons while pursuing the disaffected dweeb, played by Neil Casey, behind the mayhem.”

Chris Hemsworth shows up as the Ghostbusters’ completely oblivious secretary, another example of a spark of inspiration that looks underdeveloped, and never works the right way. You can see the layers in the film’s calculation, gives its desire to inspire girls and women with strong role models. Sadly, it fails to capture the talent, the charm strangely restricted. Serba ended his review by saying, “It also stumbles in its subjective objective to be funny - I laughed twice, when I should be losing count - recycling old jokes from the first "Ghostbusters" and from other movies, instead of creating new ones.”

I’m sorry to say that I didn’t enjoy this movie entirely. I know that people love this movie, but I was underwhelmed when I saw this. No, I didn’t go to the theaters to see this, but I saw it as a rental from the library, and I felt like it was a good idea that I didn’t waste money by going to the theaters to see it. If you want to see it, you can, but I don’t recommend it at all. Not to say that I hated this movie, but I thought it was just average. I felt like they should have made a “Ghostbusters 3,” but they never did because of Bill Murray not wanting to be involved, even though he makes a cameo in here. If he said he would make a cameo in this remake, why not make him do a cameo if they made a third movie? Make the movie without him, but let him come in as a cameo. But no, we got this average remake, which is a shame because I felt like this movie could have had potential for being a good remake, if not for the jokes that really felt flat. The only characters I enjoyed were Hemsworth’s and Jones’s character. They were the only ones that I felt were funny.

Alright everyone, now we have come to the conclusion of this year’s “Halloween Month.” I know I said originally that I had 31 movies picked out, but I ended up doing more. Just some things came up so I decided to do a little more than I thought I would. However, like I have already stated, I will be discontinuing “Halloween Month” as a month long marathon. Now I will be shortening it to either a franchise that will be spread out throughout the month or the usual Friday reviews. I feel this is right because I want to open my doors up for more time and effort into my reviews. Be sure to check out all my past “Halloween Month” reviews on my blog to see what other horror movies I recommended and didn’t. I never thought that I would be doing a month long marathon for five years in a row, but now I feel is a good time to stop that.

Happy Halloween to all my online readers! Make sure to go out tonight in your favorite costumes, get a lot of candy, snack on them while watching some horror films. Just be careful of getting cavities and gingivitis from all that sugar, which is bad for you. Don’t even go into a diabetic shock from eating too much of those, but even the rations out. The night is young, and now is the right time to come to that great celebration that comes around every year at this time, which is a transition from the fall into the winter.

In the meantime, I’m going to take a few days off before starting back on my usual Friday reviews, which is what I need after overworking myself this month again. See you guys in November.

The Huntsman: Winter's War

If you liked “Frozen” but wish it had been darker, “The Huntsman: Winter’s War,” released in 2016, is for you.

It’s about two royal sisters, one who finds out in anger that she has the ability of ice attack from her fingertips – so she exiles herself to the mountains, where she makes her own kingdom and builds her own army. She even wears immoral gowns in different shades of pale blue and puts her hair in detailed braids.

Really, this is what “The Huntsman: Winter’s War” is about.

Christy Lemire said in her review, “But before you can say “let it go,” this sorta-prequel, sorta-sequel, sorta-something-in-between to 2012’s “Snow White and the Huntsman” trots out several other subplots, all of which combine to make a messy (and less-than-magical) narrative.”

The original film worked as a dark take on the familiar “Snow White” story, with amazingly beautiful, intense imagery and highly villainous take from Charlize Theron as the evil queen. It was enjoyable but empty, but at least it kept focus and sucked you in. Lemire said, “This time, first-time feature director Cedric Nicolas-Troyan (taking over for Rupert Sanders) has trouble juggling all the scattered storylines in Evan Spiliotopoulos and Craig Mazin’s script.”

Is “Winter’s War” about a fight between two sisters, the shameful Ravenna (Theron) and the shocked Freya (Emily Blunt)? Is it about the forbidden love between Freya’s two best soldiers, huntsman Eric (Chris Hemsworth) and hardcore Sara (Jessica Chastain)? Is it about Snow White, who’s mentioned with great respect but is seen only a couple times in the short, unclear of flashbacks? (Unlike Theron and Hemsworth, Kristen Stewart does not return for the sequel, despite being the protagonist in the first movie. Lemire mentioned, “Even my six-year-old kid thought that seemed weird.”) Or is it about the backbiting, digitally-enhanced dwarfs, played by Nick Frost and Rob Brydon, who basically are comic relief?

Lemire is right when she said, “The only cohesive force is a pervasive sense of self-serious dreariness. With the exception of a brief visit to a forest full of fairy sprites and vibrantly-hued creatures, “Winter’s War” is as monotonously somber as the title would suggest.”

It starts with a murder of a baby and changes to the kidnapping and training of child soldiers (they’re not just for young adult adaptations anymore!) to serve as the terrible Freya’s army as she wants revenge from the top of snow-covered hills. Freya has made it clear that love is illegal, but her two deadliest weapons, Eric and Sara, have dared to fall in love – and she shatters their chances to do that. Motivations aren’t really complicated here, but the universal voiceover from Liam Neeson tells everything for us nonetheless.

Seven years later (and in the timeline, after what happened in “Snow White and the Huntsman,” for those who was paying attention), Ravenna may or may not be dead. However, the mirror that created her is missing, and everyone’s looking for it, because it must be powerful or something along those lines. It is the shiny, golden McGuffin, and it can either bring people together or break them apart.

As for the work it does on Hemsworth and Chastain’s characters, it could go either way – but then again, who really cares? As liking as they are separately, they don’t share any chemistry with one another. Their love scenes (including one that just happens in the only hot tub in this entire frozen area) are completely disinteresting to watch. Lemire said, “Their flirty banter isn’t much better, and only in part because they’re speaking in inconsistent Scottish accents. Hemsworth is borderline unintelligible much of the time, and not in an intentionally funny, Brad-Pitt-in-“Snatch” kind of way; Chastain’s brogue flits in and out. And luminous and versatile as Chastain is, playing the warrior princess isn’t her strong suit.”

The other main actors here – Theron and Blunt – bring a once in a while enjoyable corniness to the actions as fighting queens. Blunt can be very scary as the destroyed Freya, as she does her best to introduce strength to the character that doesn’t exist on screen. Meanwhile, Theron is hamming it up to a point, it’s like she’s in a completely different movie – one with some life to it that you’d actually want to watch.

Lemire noted, “Nicolas-Troyan has a visual effects background (including an Oscar nomination for his work on “Snow White and the Huntsman”) so the major set pieces can be striking at times, especially the moments involving the mirror itself in all its hypnotic allure.” However, a lot of the action is just boring and emotionally broken – one-note, repeating fights with axes/sticks/swords/etc.

Lemire noted, The costumes are mind-bogglingly beautiful, though—the work of the great Colleen Atwood, 11-time Oscar nominee and three-time winner (for “Chicago,” “Memoirs of a Geisha” and “Alice in Wonderland”) who also designed the clothes for the original “Huntsman.” The luxuriously appointed gowns range from gold-and-black, bird-fetish chic for the statuesque Theron to crisp and crystalline grays and blues for Blunt—although it’s clear that the cold never bothered her anyway.”

If you liked “Snow White and the Huntsman,” like I did, then you will not like this movie. It’s a dumped down, terrible follow-up to the first movie. It was just a boring, repetitive film that served no purpose. Why make a sequel? There was no need for it, so it may have been just for money. Just avoid this film at all cost.

Now that we have gotten that out of the way, stay tuned tomorrow for the finale of this year’s “Halloween Month.”

A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)

If you get straight to the point, “A Nightmare on Elm Street” is a 2010 remake about people trying not to fall asleep. Eric D. Snider admitted in his review, “Having just watched it, I know how they feel. OH SNAP!”

There was no point to remaking the 1985 slasher classic, as you might have guessed, except that “Halloween” and “Friday the 13^th” were already remade, and they thought to complete the trifecta. However, it could have been done with better care than what we got. The idea of a person who haunts you in your nightmares is really scary – or, it should be. Leave it to the people in charge of remakes to suck out all the horror of something as simple as that.

In the town of Springwood, Ohio, some of the teenagers are haunted by nightmares where a burnt-faced, razor-fingered mental person named Freddy Krueger, played this time by Jackie Earle Haley, tortures them. It is told that whatever Freddy does to you in your nightmares happens when you wake up. Snider asked, “So, for example, if Freddy gives you a wedgie, you’ll wake up with a wedgie. Or if he slices you in half with a machete, your sleeping body will be rent in twain by an invisible force.”

Among the ordinary teens that are haunted are Quentin (Kyle Gallner) and Nancy (Rooney Mara), who are both threatening and dark anyway. Kind of lighter, though still gloomy, are Kris (Katie Cassidy), Jesse (Thomas Dekker) and Dean (Kellan Lutz). Don’t get too friendly to them though. 

Snider admitted, “Look, I’m not going to mince words.” Some of these characters die. What’s disappointing is that not one of them dies in a fascinating way. Freddy mostly does the usual ways such as stabbing and slicing, and everyone’s nightmares seems to be the boiler room, the one where there’s always lots of clanging and steam and so forth. Whatever happens to the kids is followed with knife-sharpening sound and booming of “scary” music. Snider said, “This is Scary Movie Making 101, and first-time director Samuel Bayer (he made music videos before this) may be required to repeat the course.”

Should I say that the screenplay – written by Wesley Strick and rewritten by Eric Heisserer – has the characters speaking only the most basic dialogue? Also, the characters themselves have no noticeable personality traits? Also, there isn’t an actual protagonist, but just characters that don’t get killed? Oh, I didn’t need to say that because you already know that? Good.

What the film does get right is Freddy Krueger. The later sequels in the original franchise made him into a wise-cracking, one-liner-dispensing foil without any type of fear. The new Freddy returns to basics. Played with nasty delight by Jackie Earle Haley, this Freddy is good and scary, the way Wes Craven original wanted. Too bad he’s in a nightmare of his own: a movie that doesn’t have humor, originality, inspiration or suspense. Snider ended his review by saying, “Wake me up when they come out with something new.”

Like the “Friday the 13^th” remake, this is the first one that I saw of the “Nightmare on Elm Street” franchise, and just like the “Friday the 13^th” remake, I hated this remake. I hadn’t even seen the original movies, and this one made me hate the remake, noticing how poorly it was made. Also, Jackie Earle Haley sounds exactly like he did in “Watchmen.” Are his vocal cords just used to speaking that way, or can he not even try and imitate the way Robert Englund made Freddy sound? I don’t know, but this movie was just superfluous. They shouldn’t have made it. If you want to watch any of the movies, the first, third, and “Wes Craven’s New Nightmare” are the ones that are the best. You can watch the other sequels if you want, but this remake is, hands down, the worst in the franchise.

Well, we have finally reached the end of our “Elm Street-a-thon.” Sorry we had to end off on a bad note, but we have finally made it through. Check in later today where I review another movie that is a horrible sequel to a nice, dark movie. I know I have looked at a lot of those, but this is one that I feel like I should share my thoughts on in this year’s “Halloween Month.”

Freddy vs Jason

“Freddy vs. Jason,” released in 2003, is a horror film for people who don’t really hate the genre in general but find themselves annoyed and underwhelmed by it more often than not. Mark Dujsik said in his review, “This is a movie that I remember hearing rumors about when I was young—let's say a little over a decade ago.” It finally got made, not as a horror film, but as a tribute to everything we’ve come to expect from horror movies and little nods in the core to those same moments. This was teased at ever since Freddy's glove came out of the ground and drag Jason's hockey mask down with him at the end of "Jason Goes to Hell." Didn't take them until 10 years later to finally get this movie made. Director Ronny Yu plays with the clichés, from the superfluous nudity to the bizarre death scenes to the teenage evil that leads the nonstop murders to cause punishment, and gives us one of the better examples of the post-modern (Dujsik asked, “or would this be post-post-modern now that it's going back to the genre's modern roots?”) school of horror creation. Yu and screenwriters David S. Goyer, Damian Shannon, and Mark Swift manage – either by some skilled work or an incredibly convenient twist – to suck us into the complete and total craziness of the film gradually, working over our expectations, giving us to discover the film’s sense of humor, and finishing off with the superb main fight of two horror icons.

Freddy Krueger of the “Nightmare on Elm Street” franchise has been dead for a long time, but what’s even worse for the nightmare serial killer is that nobody remembers him. Without fear, Freddy cannot come into the nightmares of those he wants to torture and kill. In order to help people remember him, he invades the dreams of fellow murderer Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger) of the “Friday the 13^th” franchise, as Jason’s mother (Paula Shaw), who has also been dead for a long time, to convince him to start a mass murder on Freddy’s old neighborhood on Elm Street. There we meet the usual variety of potential victims, including Lori (Monica Keena), the desperate protagonist with a dead in the past, Kia (Kelly Rowland), the narcissistic one, and Gibb (Katharine Isabelle), the tomboy. Needless to say, Jason kills a couple of unimportant characters (David Kopp, Jesse Hutch, Zack Ward and Odessa Munroe), and the police try to not believe that Freddy has come back. All of that will be for nothing when Will (Jason Ritter) and Mark (Brendan Fletcher) escape from an asylum to make sure Lori, Will’s childhood girlfriend, is safe.

The movie begins mainly as the next “Nightmare on Elm Street” movie, but it slowly gets to the movie the title says. The movie’s diabolical sense of humor is made right away with a needless skinny dipping/murder scene with the hot Odessa Munroe who also morphs into Blake Mawson and Jamie Mayo. A few violent deaths follow, which include the sandwiching of a bed and a decapitated head as a practical but useless shield, and Yu makes fun of the rule that bad behavior goes to violent payback. Dujsik said, “Note the way that Jason's signature breathing appears immediately after one victim takes a swig from a flask.” Yu also smartly realizes the nightmare scenes, giving them a real sense of horror. However, it’s when Freddy and Jason start to in some way compete against one another for victims in a cornfield part scene that movie finds its balance. Dujsik said, “I can and would not deny that my face was stuck in a big, goofy smile from this sequence on. Freddy has a passed-out partier trapped in a nightmare warehouse, and Jason is stalking around, searching for debauchery. And when he finds it, the body count swiftly rises (I doubt this is the most squibs ever used in a movie, but I can't remember this much blood spraying in a while).”

Once it scores a basket, the movie takes on the look of the old monster fight movies. It lets each villain do their own killings and then has them come together in a long fight. Dujsik said, “The screenwriters are smart to give us the monsters' back story, especially for those who—like me—haven't been completely loyal to either series, and to simplify their motivations and methods.” Jason is a giant, misunderstood klutz who kills because it’s the only thing he can do. Freddy is the rough, misogynistic person who kills because it’s what he does best. On a humor level, Freddy is the funny one and Jason is the silent one. The story with the teenagers continues, but it comes more and more ridiculous and, as Yu has put us in the right state, even funnier. Eventually, Freddy and Jason find themselves fighting in Freddy’s warehouse and Jason’s old home at Camp Crystal Lake, which is under construction (maybe for that Crystal Lake Research Facility from the thankfully forgotten “Jason X?”) and gives a lot of variety of equipment and explosives to use as weapons.

Dujsik said, “It's an intense visceral rumble, exactly what Freddy Vs. Jason promises, and gives us the third fight between two immortals this year.” The film has a few surprises besides its humor and overall hilarity level. It gives a sense of understanding for Jason during a flashback moment of his first death, and even has a little moving murder for one of its teenage victims who realize he’s about to die. Dujsik said, “Of course, that death is followed soon after by a sudden, unexpected, and funny death to compensate.” What makes this movie work is the balance and thought of another fight between either these two or with Michael Myers.

In the end, I know that this film may not be good, but I think it was awesome to finally see these two fight one another. If you love these two villains, then definitely see this crossover. I think you will love it, but if you don’t, I understand. I’m just happy that I saw it because I loved it. Also, the reason why I didn’t review this movie after “Jason X” is because I first wanted to talk about the “Nightmare on Elm Street” franchise first. That actually makes sense, doesn’t it?

Alright everyone tomorrow is finally it. I will be looking at the horrible remake of the franchise. I know that I’m not looking forward to it, but the sooner I get it over with, the better. Stay tuned tomorrow when I finished off “Elm Street-a-thon” with the last in the franchise in this year’s “Halloween Month.”

Wes Craven's New Nightmare

I know that I already had stated this in my past reviews, but “Wes Craven’s New Nightmare,” released in 1994, comes with Freddy’s past history. When he was first conceived in the 1984 original, Freddy Kruegar was the new killer in the slasher genre. Before him were Leatherface from “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” Michael Myers from “Halloween,” Jason Voorhees from “Friday the 13^th,” and other efficient, famous slasher villains of the late seventies and early eighties, but unlike every one of those silent slashers, Freddy spoke and was one of the best villains – and by invading nightmares, he really got into the heads of the teenagers.

However, five sequels later and Freddy was the franchise was over – something that his last movie clearly said in its title “Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare.” Anton Bitel said in his review, “By then, surprise had become schtick, invention had turned to gimmick, and Freddy, far from inspiring genuine fear, had become little more than a comedy villain, dispensing corny one-liners as he dispatched his victims in ever more carnivalesque ways. Freddy’s demise has run in parallel with the state of the horror genre, which has, for much of this decade, been parlous at best. Might this new nightmare be a sign of horror’s resurrection, and a fresh direction for the moribund genre?”

Bitel continued, “The opening shot of Wes Craven’s New Nightmare shows the burn-scarred Freddy smithing his blade-fingered glove beside a familiar furnace, before chopping off his own hand to accommodate this claw.” So far, it’s the same thing – until the camera shows director Wes Craven, his cast and crew filming the scene on a studio film set. The film’s complete title shows not only Craven’s return to his own film creation, but also his active role in it, playing himself as both writer and director of a film whose own creation it is subject. Suddenly the animatronic claw prop malfunctions, killing two of the special effects men (Matt Winston and Rob LaBelle) – only for Heather Langenkamp, who played Nancy in the first and third movies (but here plays herself), to wake up in her LA bed. Also, John Saxon is back in this one. Bitel said, “The killer glove, you see, was all just a nightmare, from which Heather was roused by an earthquake – a common enough local phenomenon that exposes to Californians their hidden infernal foundations. And so, in this opening sequence, Craven sets up a close interplay between dreams, cinema and reality, in the very Hollywood milieu where those three categories are most easily confused.” This is not in any way like the previous movies, seeing how it doesn’t take place on Elm Street.

Hunted by a hateful caller (who sounds exactly like Freddy), also with a family history of insanity, and constantly having Freddy nightmares, Heather is already having high anxiety when she is invited to return to the franchise that made her famous for being scared. When her husband Chase (David Newsom) is killed in a car accident while working on a prop for the film, Heahter and her young son Dylan (Miko Hughes from “Full House”) become convinced that Freddy – or something like him – is back, and trying to come back to the real world. Bitel asked, “Is this a shared fantasy with which mother and son are working through their grief? Or an ancient evil emerging through a seismic rift, in a guise borrowed from the collective unconscious that the Elm Street franchise has helped inform? Or is it just a horror script being realised before our very eyes, to bring circular closure to Craven’s own particular preoccupations?”

After that can be a repeat of many memorable parts from the original movie: a tongue coming out of the telephone, Heather’s hair turning grey, Dylan’s babysitter Julie, played by Tracy Middendorf, being dragged across the doctor’s ceiling in blood, stairs turning to mud, Freddy’s arms stretching unusually. Bitel said, “Yet even as Freddy is overtly acknowledged as an iconic movie monster – and Englund (playing himself playing Freddy) is shown hamming it up before his adoring fanbase on a TV chat show – not only does this film’s new Freddy look different, but he is figured as a mere incarnation of the same timeless evil also instantiated by fairytale witches or Biblical demons. Newly psychologised, theologised and mythologised, he is the meta-bogeyman on whom Craven can hang all manner of enquiries about what horror is, what impact it has, and what purpose it serves.” The film also gives a sneaky look of its own now fixed franchise, a decade on when everyone involved – actors, creators and audiences alike – are now older and wiser.

Bitel ended his review by saying, “If this sort of postmodernism catches on, then I know what even the most jaded horror fans will be doing next summer: happily returning to the cinema to see films that once again make them scream…”

This movie is almost as good as the first and third movies, so if you loved those a lot, then you will definitely love this one. I liked how it did something different instead of redoing the same stuff again. What’s best is the look they give Freddy in this movie, which is actually much creepier than in the first movie. If you hadn’t been impressed by the sequels after three, this one will get you pumped again. If this was going to be the last of the franchise, I would have been happy with it.

However, this was not the final installment. Look out tomorrow when we look at a good crossover in “Elm Street-a-thon” that people may not have liked, but I thought was really good and definitely worth looking at. Check in tomorrow when I tell you what I mean in “Halloween Month.”

Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare

Freddy Kruegar, who used to live on Elm Street, Springwood, USA, was killed after countless meetings with teenagers in the nightmares in their sleep. Freddy, a guilty serial killer of children was freed without a search warrant and then burned to death by understandably angry parents. Freddy said he would return, which he did in a number of films titled, “A Nightmare on Elm Street.”

Sadly for Freddy, the latest sequel looks like it was the last, since it’s called “Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare.” For him it was released on Friday the 13^th in 1991.

Goodbye Freddy, it was nice knowing you. Your nightmare days are over.

Richard Harrington stated in his review, “And you're going out with a touch of class: a slam-bang finale in 3-D -- make that Freddyvision; a gaggle of one-liners directed at the final crop of victims and a few in-jokes; some wonderfully bizarre dream sequences; and the possibility that while Freddy may be gone, some of his progeny may live on (we can say no more).”

“Freddy’s Dead” starts with John, played by Shon Greenblatt, the last surviving Springwood kid, having, you guessed it, a nightmare, this one which has planes, houses and heights, the increasing case of what’s called amnesia (movies being the one place where people suffer from this story-assisting problem). What happens is that a bus picks up John and he goes to another town’s shelter for troubled teens, where therapists Doc (Taphet Kotto) and Maggie (Lisa Zane, looking like Madonna) are usually hesitant to believe in the idea of a dream killer, despite that Maggie’s been having this one dream about a little girl (Cassandra Rachel Friel) and a faceless father. The girl’s been in John’s dreams as well.

There are other disturbed kids at the shelter: Tracy (Lezlie Deane), a martial artist, Spencer (Breckin Meyer), a video game addict, and Carlos (Ricky Dean Logan), who is deaf. I guess you can say they are in trouble. Especially when the team goes back to Springwood, where they find no kids but do run into a cameo of Roseanne and Tom Arnold.

Soon enough, the nightmares are in full swing, and Freddy does what he does best in the crazy nightmares. Freddy shows that he is skilled in playing Atari, especially when he has a Power Glove installed on his arm. He also has a fun time with Tracy (that’s all I can say).

Harrington said, “To the end, moviegoers are being given clues about Freddy's origins and insights into his behavior, and so what if they sometimes contradict previous mythology. Logic has only a foothold here, particularly as the film winds to its 3-D conclusion inside Freddy's head -- talk about a fantastic voyage! By that time, we know who Freddy's child is and everything takes on the hue and cry of convoluted intra-family mayhem that has always informed the series. It's an explosive ending, to say the least, but, um, we can say no more.”

Freddy does say, “I am forever. Too bad you’re not.” Actually Freddy, you’re not forever.

In the end, this movie does have its highlights, but this is where it got silly. I will say check it out, but bear in mind, much like “Friday the 13^th Part 3” the 3D will be very distracting, especially since you won’t have the glasses while watching it. As you might have guessed, this movie is not the last in the series, since we still have three more to review.

Speaking of which, look out tomorrow when I look at another one of the best in the series. It does seem right since we have gone through a few of just middle of the road, average films that did have enjoyments and highlights to them. “Elm Street-a-thon” will be getting back to some of the best in the franchise tomorrow in the continuation of “Halloween Month.”

A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child

Director Stephen Hopkins decides to make an attempt in the fifth movie to bring Freddy back, “A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child,” released in 1989. The script was written by Leslie Bohen, from a story by Bohem and novelists John Kipp and Craig Spector, using the survivors of “The Dream Child,” with concepts taken from “The Dream Warriors.”

Alice (Lisa Wilcox) and Dan (Danny Hassel) have survived to complete high school and accomplish their love. Their plan to spend the summer in Europe is interrupted by Freddy Krueger’s resurrection to Alice’s dreams. However, this time she finds herself playing Freddy’s mother, Amanda – a nun left alone in an asylum and assaulted by so many insane patients in one of the film’s more disturbing moments. She soon finds out that Amanda’s spirit, played by Beatrice Boepple, is trying to make contact with her so she can try and finally stop Freddy (like that’s ever going to happen).

She also finds herself dreaming of a kid named Jacob, played by Whitby Herford, who is actually Alice and Dan’s unborn son. Freddy is using the dreams of Jacob’s to attack her and her friends even while she’s awake. He wants to be inside Alice’s womb instead of Jacob so he can be reborn and live to terrorize again.

The typical teenage friends are on board to give Freddy another body count, including supermodel Greta (Erika Anderson), comic book lover Mark (Joe Seely), and champion swimmer Yvonne (Kelly Jo Minter). How Alice and Dan manage to have any friends at all after six of them were brutally killed in the last film is a question you’ll be asking.

Once again, Freddy haunts his victims in a series of vignettes, laughing out loud at his own puns, killing the friends through their own weaknesses: Greta is forced feed until her face is obese, Mark becomes a human comic strip, and Yvonne is dragged down to a boiler room with the diving board coming to life and jumping off, almost drowning.

Paul V. Wargelin said in his review, “Special effects crew Adam Jones (TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY) and Alan Munro (ADDAMS FAMILY, ADDAMS FAMILY VALUES) handle the gore chores admirably.” The most creative kill is when a truck and motorcycle attack Dan with their car parts such as seat belts and gas hoses.

Wargelin mentioned, “Other effective moments include a shower scene (which owes homage to both Hitchcock’s PSYCHO and Wes Craven’s bathtub sequence in the original A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET), and the asylum lunatics behaving like the zombies of George A. Romero's Dead trilogy (not really surprising considering Skipp and Spector's love for Romero's films). But THE DREAM CHILD contains Freddy's most embarrassing moment in the series when he uses a skateboard in pursuit of a victim - echoing the 1960s Batman TV show when the Caped Crusader surfed against the Joker.”

Overall, “A Nightmare on Elm Street 5” has better material and potential than the last movie, but suffers from continuing the pattern of having humor over horror which wasn’t a good idea. This just makes the film average. It’s definitely weak compared the last ones, and that is a shame that they made this convoluted and somewhat forgettable. However, you can’t deny how entertaining this movie is, which makes you want to watch it. If you want to, give it a watch, but this is up to you.

Alright everyone, hold on tight tomorrow when we look at the next installment in “Elm Street-a-thon” in this year’s “Halloween Month.”