I suppose I'll always have a sentimental liking for A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge
, as it's the first Freddy Krueger film I ever saw at the tender age of five and features a scary, mostly wordless Freddy that is on par with the creepiness eminated from the character in the original
. I'll never be able to shake the film's opening and ending parallel scenes with Freddy taking evil control of a yellow schoolbus and driving into the desert with his teenage prey, and I can distinctly recall the apprehension I had a few days after seeing this film when boarding for the first time in my young life the long yellow vehicle on my first day of school. Obviously a lot of my liking for this sequel has to do with seeing it at such an impressionable age, but I also saw other horror films (clips of them at least) as a child and some of them have not aged as well IMHO as Freddy's Revenge. It actually made slightly more at the box office than its Wes Craven predecessor, and while I think the original is superior, I'm still convinced that Freddy's Revenge is a very decent Freddy film and not the stinkbomb that a lot of IMDB user reviews would lead you to believe it is.
The main problem with Freddy's Revenge (which I admittedly didn't notice when I was younger) is the writing, which has some rather large plotholes that are never really resolved. Freddy appears to be able to manifest himself in the real world through the body of teenage Jesse (Mark Patton) after the boy and his family move into Nancy's old house, which should be impossible according to the logic of the first film (and even this one) and has always made me secretly wonder whether the scenes of Jesse becoming Freddy were in the boy's own mind. That would imply that the scene of Freddy ripping his way out of Jesse's body in Grady's bedroom did not happen literally but was what Jesse believed was happening, and would really make sense when Jesse looks in the mirror after killing Grady and sees cackling Freddy. The effects in this scene are a little hokey, but still better than today's overdone CGI, and it's a cool and memorable sequence today with Jesse smashing the mirror with his newfound murder glove, creating the warped illusion of a tiny laughing Freddy in each broken shard. This would mean the script is more creative and not as illogical as many believe it to be, but even then there's still things that don't quite make sense, like how does the fence become electrified and the pool a boiling tub in the party scene?
The kills in Freddy's Revenge are relatively infrequent, but the film makes the most of them as in the above-mentioned scene as well as the part where Jesse transforms into Freddy in the school gym shower and dices the leather-clad ex-marine Coach Schneider (Marshall Bell). There's also a scene at a pool party at Jesse's girlfriend Lisa's (Meryl Streep lookalike Kim Myers) house that has Freddy running around and creating havoc by slicing and dicing his way through the terrified young partygoers. There's some decent gore and a nice bit of suspense in these scenes, generated mostly by the generally solid direction of Jack Sholder (fresh from helming the terrific Alone in the Dark). The film has a dark, brooding atmosphere similar to the first film with the rare touch of tongue-in-cheek humor to temper it. As I've already mentioned, there's a number of plot inconsistencies in the David Chaskin script (which was reportedly written quickly and perfunctorily to cash in on the success of the first film), one being: Why doesn't the police, knowing that Coach Schneider is found dead, naked and chained to a showerhead in the gym AND AFTER picking up a naked and disoriented Jesse on the side of the road the very same night, not put two and two together and at least investigate Jesse?
Horror fans will enjoy this sequel much more if they try to not dwell on such irregularities and lapses of logic and just enjoy the film for what it is -- an '80s slasher film. The genre has certainly never been revered for its logic, so there's little point in bullying this one simply because it adds a supernatural twist to the formula but doesn't always stay true to its own logic. There's a definite gay undertone to the script, what with Freddy wanting to take control of Jesse's athletic young body; the stereotypical S&M loving Coach Schneider being tied to a showerhead and ass-whipped with a barrage of gym towels; and Jesse freaking out after his heavy make-out session with Lisa is interrupted by the Freddy within him, sending the boy to find comfort in the bedroom of his pal Grady (Robert Rusler) and resulting in the gruesome transformation scene mentioned earlier.
The acting is serviceable, with veteran actors Clu Gulager and Hope Lange both terrific in their thankless roles as Jesse's concerned parents and Robert Englund making the most of his somewhat limited screen time as Freddy. The film has a brisk pace and relatively brief 81-minute running time, so ADDers shouldn't be too terribly distracted while watching. It's safe to say that Part 2 is not popular with many fans of the series, and many consider it a black sheep, but IMO, in spite of its warts, it's worthy of a 7 of 10 for sheer energy and imagination and for keeping Freddy scary by not overusing him.
(If you enjoyed this article, I've also reviewed A Nightmare on Elm Street, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master and A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child.)
, as it's the first Freddy Krueger film I ever saw at the tender age of five and features a scary, mostly wordless Freddy that is on par with the creepiness eminated from the character in the original. I'll never be able to shake the film's opening and ending parallel scenes with Freddy taking evil control of a yellow schoolbus and driving into the desert with his teenage prey, and I can distinctly recall the apprehension I had a few days after seeing this film when boarding for the first time in my young life the long yellow vehicle on my first day of school. Obviously a lot of my liking for this sequel has to do with seeing it at such an impressionable age, but I also saw other horror films (clips of them at least) as a child and some of them have not aged as well IMHO as Freddy's Revenge. It actually made slightly more at the box office than its Wes Craven predecessor, and while I think the original is superior, I'm still convinced that Freddy's Revenge is a very decent Freddy film and not the stinkbomb that a lot of IMDB user reviews would lead you to believe it is. The main problem with Freddy's Revenge (which I admittedly didn't notice when I was younger) is the writing, which has some rather large plotholes that are never really resolved. Freddy appears to be able to manifest himself in the real world through the body of teenage Jesse (Mark Patton) after the boy and his family move into Nancy's old house, which should be impossible according to the logic of the first film
(and even this one) and has always made me secretly wonder whether the scenes of Jesse becoming Freddy were in the boy's own mind. That would imply that the scene of Freddy ripping his way out of Jesse's body in Grady's bedroom did not happen literally but was what Jesse believed was happening, and would really make sense when Jesse looks in the mirror after killing Grady and sees cackling Freddy. The effects in this scene are a little hokey, but still better than today's overdone CGI, and it's a cool and memorable sequence today with Jesse smashing the mirror with his newfound murder glove, creating the warped illusion of a tiny laughing Freddy in each broken shard. This would mean the script is more creative and not as illogical as many believe it to be, but even then there's still things that don't quite make sense, like how does the fence become electrified and the pool a boiling tub in the party scene?The kills in Freddy's Revenge
are relatively infrequent, but the film makes the most of them as in the above-mentioned scene as well as the part where Jesse transforms into Freddy in the school gym shower and dices the leather-clad ex-marine Coach Schneider (Marshall Bell). There's also a scene at a pool party at Jesse's girlfriend Lisa's (Meryl Streep lookalike Kim Myers) house that has Freddy running around and creating havoc by slicing and dicing his way through the terrified young partygoers. There's some decent gore and a nice bit of suspense in these scenes, generated mostly by the generally solid direction of Jack Sholder (fresh from helming the terrific Alone in the Dark). The film has a dark, brooding atmosphere similar to the first film with the rare touch of tongue-in-cheek humor to temper it. As I've already mentioned, there's a number of plot inconsistencies in the David Chaskin script (which was reportedly written quickly and perfunctorily to cash in on the success of the first film), one being: Why doesn't the police, knowing that Coach Schneider is found dead, naked and chained to a showerhead in the gym AND AFTER picking up a naked and disoriented Jesse on the side of the road the very same night, not put two and two together and at least investigate Jesse? Horror fans will enjoy this sequel much more if they try to not dwell on such irregularities and lapses of logic and just enjoy the film for what it is -- an '80s slasher film. The genre has certainly never been revered for its logic, so there's little point in bullying this one simply because it adds a supernatural twist to the formula but doesn't always stay true to its own logic. There's a definite gay undertone to the script, what with Freddy wanting to take control of Jesse's athletic young body; the stereotypical S&M loving Coach Schneider being tied to a showerhead and ass-whipped with a barrage of gym towels; and Jesse freaking out after his heavy make-out session with Lisa is interrupted by the Freddy within him, sending the boy to find comfort in the bedroom of his pal Grady (Robert Rusler) and resulting in the gruesome transformation scene mentioned earlier.
The acting is serviceable, with veteran actors Clu Gulager and Hope Lange both terrific in their thankless roles as Jesse's concerned parents and Robert Englund making the most of his somewhat limited screen time as Freddy. The film has a brisk pace and relatively brief 81-minute running time, so ADDers shouldn't be too terribly distracted while watching. It's safe to say that Part 2
is not popular with many fans of the series, and many consider it a black sheep, but IMO, in spite of its warts, it's worthy of a 7 of 10 for sheer energy and imagination and for keeping Freddy scary by not overusing him. (If you enjoyed this article, I've also reviewed A Nightmare on Elm Street, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master and A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child.)
