A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors - 1987

In addition to my 70s boxset marathon, I also had a Nightmare marathon.  Look for my upcoming review of Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master.  Also, here is my review for Nightmare 5.

I have to say first off, this was going against Nightmare 5 in my head.  Perhaps because they are sequels and naturally as a movie series they're all going to be judged against one another.  But, I have also always heard that Nightmare 1 and 3 are the "good ones" and that the others aren't as good.  Then, I enjoyed Nightmare 5.  Hence the fucking whatever bullshit, you get what I mean.

Nightmare 3 brings back Heather Langenkamp from the first film, returning as Nancy.  However first we follow Kristen, played by Patricia Arquette.  Kristen is being haunted by Freddy in her dreams, and gets sent off to a psyche ward for a small group of people who are all insomniacs complaining of horrible nightmares when they do sleep.  Nancy is interning at the psyche ward, and eventually they discover the source of all their nightmares is Freddy, who is coming back to claim more souls.  Kristen has the power to pull people into her dreams, and they think they can use this power to team up and beat Freddy at his own game.

The movie is a bit of a slower ride in the beginning, I'll say.  There's a lot of plot and not as much immediate horror thrills, although they are certainly there.  There's a great sequence where they use a claymation Freddy, I liked that a lot.  The little group of insomniacs are a rat pack of fun characters, each one likable and with their own "gimmick" thingy.  They have individual dream strengths they can use against Freddy, which although arguably stupid, are still fun to see.

The deaths are really good too.  There's a genuinely cringe-worthy scene where Freddy pulls out a dude's veins and controls him like a puppet with them.  That one was fucking awesome.  I have to say, at this point (and I noticed this in 5 as well) they sort of stopped following that rule of "what Freddy does to you in the dream happens to you in real life".  It happens sometimes.  But clearly at some points people are being injured or whatever, then they wake up and they're fine.

I didn't like this as much as 5 though.  It was simply a pacing thing.  5 is wall to wall horror violence and insanity.  This is perhaps more of a "movie"  in the development feel, and I'd only say it's a very small point, but I just have that preference I guess.  There is however another cool sequence in a car graveyard that has a claymation Harryhauser-esque skeleton...  Hm.  Maybe I did like this as much as 5.  I can't bring myself to rate this lower that 5.  Fine.  Here, another 4 star Nightmare entry.