Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy and My Impression on the Movie Series

Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy - 3.5/5

With this summer debatably having the most sequels of all time, everyone has their own opinions on serial movies. Do they work? Are they unoriginal? Why are they so popular? For some, when a favorite movie gets slapped with the foreboding green light to sequel, teeth cringe. This even happens to movies the person didn't terribly like either. Why is Hollywood so unoriginal? Why must they continue a story they already made and finished?
One would argue that it makes Hollywood loads of money. Some big-name series that have made it to theaters with very successful (if not more) sequels like Pirates of the Caribbean and Transformers create huge uproars. Why oh why do they want to make more of this "garbage"? Well, for starters both Pirates 2 and 3 are in the top 10 highest grossing movies of all time worldwide and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is number 11 domestic making almost $100 million more than its predecessor. Obviously, it pays to sequel. What's so wrong with continuing a product that will make a company more money? Apple does it all the time with their "re-inventing" of the iphone. Why can't a movie company earn back more money so they can keep in business. They're also keeping their public happy with the continuation of films that super-fans really want to see more of.

However, this not only happens in Hollywood, but happens in every country with every popular movie franchise. People complain constantly saying it's Hollywood that's not original, but alas (!!): China has their very popular Love Undercover series and The Eye trilogy, and Korea has Marrying the Mafia I through III. So it's apparent that Hollywood is not the only country who has caught on to this sneaky marketing ploy. There are also series of films that are adapted from books like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. However, those usually aren't piled in and tagged with the dreadful "movie series" logo because those were lucky enough to be series in book form prior. So my question here is what's the different between a book and a film series? They're both stories, aren't they? Then we come to your very famous series that usually aren't worth complaining about like Star Wars, The Godfather, and the new Batman series (though maybe this is where I should mention The Godfather was actually a book too before being film).

Then here comes the dreaded horror sequel. The genre that easily has the "worst" and most "gimmicky" sequels and series of them all. They create something original that excites fans everywhere and then continue to make these huge box office money-makers (percentage-wise) and spew them out fairly cheaply. Some famous series that had great success would be Saw and Final Destination. Which brings me to the super long 4 hour documentary I watched tonight, Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy.

What this documentary showed me is that movie series are much more than what people give them credit for. At first I only found this doc interesting because they went into depth about how they make-uped, casted, and brought to life this huge film series (and mainly the first one). It was intriguing how much money they made off this series which actually molded the backbone of the production company New Line, which later on created the Oscar winning Lord of the Rings films. This series was a landmark. Although, it was the ending that really touched me. All the people that worked on it, whether it just be in one film or them all, really and truly cared about the series as a whole. Their blood, sweat, and tears went into this franchise that is now a milestone in the horror industry. You can't tell me that's not incredible. It's changed my view on the movie series and I really think people should hold their tongues before criticizing these huge money machines.

There were also some really interesting facts I learned from the documentary. Wes Craven actually got the idea of the dream-killer Freddy from a newspaper article on how a child was afraid to go back to sleep because he had a foreboding that he would die (and his fear came true). I also learned that for one of the later Freddy movies, Peter Jackson (of Lord of the Rings fame) wrote a script that didn't make the cut, but forever attached him to the New Line production company. This series did incredible things for directors, actors, and producers. So then I ask my question again, why do we condemn sequels all the time?

Scream 4

Scream 4: 3/5

The movie that every horror fan has been waiting for has finally arrived, and doesn't disappoint -- well, almost. Scream 4 tries to be this super smart and sleek and fully self-aware horror film that exploits the mechanics of all the new horror franchises and remakes that have become popular in America over the past decade the Scream films have been on hiatus.
Within the first 5 minutes of the movie, Saw has already been name dropped and there has been a comment on J-horror remakes. This is alright for a set-up to a film that supposedly "dissects" the horror genre and exposes all the world for it to see, but unfortunately it comes across a little too Scary Movie-like. I also felt a little annoyed with the Anna Paquin cameo, because it almost felt forced to be there at all, and I was the most excited for that one.
As the film pushes through, it starts to actually feel like a Scream movie and not its cheap knock-off. Ghost Face is a little more logical on his horror film deconstruction, knowing that Peeping Tom was the first of the voyeuristic stare and slasher craze, plus many of the high school kids are supposed horror film geeks as well (their film club itself seems to revolve around classic 70's horror films) and they all love the Stab franchise. However exciting this is for a person like me who is currently in a class that specifically studies horror films, the characters in their entirety still lack one important element that even in the beginning one of the cameos states isn't in torture-porn franchises these days (ironic, huh?) - character development.
You can try all you want to defend it, but every single one of the characters that lasts until the final bloodshed doesn't have one distinct quality that separated them from each other. Maybe this could be seen as a continued exploration of the Internet generation's inability to relate to each other, but I see it as poor story telling. Every high school kid seems so unaffected by the stabbings, it's almost insulting. They prank call their friends and ask them "What's your favorite scary movie?" constantly throughout as they make googly eyes at the town's returning celeb - Sidney Prescot. However, the lack of character development could be as simple as there were too many characters that could have been called the protagonist, and not enough to call the supporting cast.
In the beginning you have the trio of semi-popular girls (Emma Roberts, Hayden Panettiere, and Marielle Jaffe) who have 2 boy-stalkers (Rory Culkin and Erik Knudsen) and an evil ex (Nico Tortorella); plus if that's not enough you have 3 returning cast members (Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, and David Arquette) and one new police officer who has a mad crush on Dewey (Marley Shelton). All totaled up, that's 10 people to keep track of, and at least 7 of them are prime suspects to be Ghost Face.
Another fault in this movie is the timing of the killings. Once the killer is revealed, and you go over all the killings in your head, it almost seems impossible that no one ever discovered their identity, especially Sidney.
A lot of the movie also tries to mirror the first and best Scream to the exact, and they also mention a few times in Scream 4 that it's impossible for any movie to "fuck with the original." Maybe the writers tried to use it as an excuse for it not being as great, but I just found it a cop out to attempt to make it fantastic.
It just feels like I'm simply complaining about the movie at this point, but I actually did like it. If any new character had any potential to be a new favorite, Hayden Panettiere sure was the best candidate. Also, the twist ending (though I found it a little obvious who the killer was) was still so brutal and sweet, but I don't want to spoil anything :). As far as slashers go, this one is an enjoyable and mindless remake, or continuation (whatever the forth movie wanted to play itself as) that could beat up Saw 4's trickiness any day. Some feel there isn't much room for a slasher film these days, but I see it differently. People want stabbings now more than ever while the torture porn industry is swaying slightly to the unpopular (but not for me, of course). I say, we should just bring back the good old 2nd half of the 90's horror films like I Know What you Did Last Summer and Urban Legend for the pure enjoyable creative stabbings they had to offer. Everyone still loves a psycho killer with a crazed mission and Scream 4 shows just that.